Toy Story 3 Animator Roundtable – Part1
Finally, a new Spline Cast!!! This is part one of a two part animation Roundtable with:
Doug Sweetland, Andy Schmidt, Jessica Torres, Cat Hicks, Carlos Baena, Kc Royer, Aaron Hartline and Myself, Andrew Gordon. Aaron thought it would be cool to do a Spline Cast talking about Toy Story 3 so we made it happen. Hope you enjoy it and the Film which opens this Friday. Expect it on itunes soon.
-Andrew
Sandra Ni Chonaola
This is super! So great to hear from newer animators and how they’re experiences compare to those long timers.
love it – cant wait for the next one!
.. I get to see the Irish prescreening of TS3, and attend a Q&A with Lee and Darla and the build up to this release is almost to much excitement to handel.
John C
Man I can’t wait for the second part. It was really interesting to hear about the style changes in each movie and how the limitation of the tools helped sculpt the characters as we know them today.
Also I was thinking how hard it must be to come up with unique character acting choices when you already have 2 great movies for reference which, as mentioned, runs the risk of reusing the same ideas, but I guess having this reference and the time between the films to allow the characters to really sink in, you know the character so well by this stage it becomes easier to know what works for the character what doesn’t.
Great work guys keep it up.
William Ward
This latest Spline Cast is such a wealth of inspiring information. It’s always interesting to hear various methods of working, especially from animators with different levels of experience. What’s most important in a shot for one person, seems to have a different meaning for another. It’s also fascinating hearing how an animator approaches an established character with a fresh eye, while keeping them familiar to the audience. I’m looking forward to Toy Story 3 and part 2 of this roundtable. Thanks Andrew for putting this together….I always learn so much!
Billy
myung lee
LIKE!
Jeremy Jutras
Excellent stuff! I cant wait for part two! Its so cool to hear how the technology and techniques have changed since the birth of the trilogy.
Andy Holden
Great! thanks for making this
one quick question before I give it a listen: is there any spoilers at all? I live in the UK so am trying my best to avoid as many as I can over the next month!
cheers
Andy
Herman G.
Thanks a million… these recordings are worth more than gold!
Keith G.
Hey guys another great podcast. I liked this one a lot and cant wait for round 2, please don’t make us wait too long!
Jose Diaz
Super Inspiring!!
Thanks a lot for this.
Murdo
Thanks, but doesn’t show up in iTunes. I think you have to reconfigure your rss stuff or something.
Theresa Adolph
I KNEW Doug Sweetland did that bathroom shot!
There was something Sweetlandy about it. Anyway, I really enjoyed listening to you guys chat about the movie and your experiences working together. It’s fun to hear how someone like Doug Sweetland, who is, shall I say ‘famous’ in the animation world, and known for doing shots with such fluidity, talk about how he’s inspired by an animator who does a very subtle shot. That really gets me thinking about how much each and every animator is inspired by the work around them.
Did Carlos do a majority of the shots with Spanish Buzz? I got a kick out of those shots.
I can’t wait to hear more. Thanks so much for putting this together.
– Theresa
Matthew Tucker
Thanks for another fantastic podcast! Is there somewhere I can learn more about the technical staff’s huddles and advances required for each new Toy Story adventure?
Sant
While I download the podcast I want to congratulate you guys on such a life-changing film experience
Toy Story 3 makes a perfect trilogy, one that we grew up with, my friends and I were Andy’s age when “Toy Story” came out, that made us connect with the story in a very different way, and now that it’s done, now that it’s over, we feel part of our lives completed, and in such an amazing and touching way! Thanks to all of you amazing animators!
Sant
Clueless
You guys seriously have to do this more often. Been in something of a slump and this podcast got me going again, keep it up, please!
Luke Minaker
Hey guys!
Just watched TS3.
You guys didn’t live up to expectations…
You surpassed them!
Congratulations on a pretty near perfect film! And thanks so much for sharing your thoughts on creating it.
Andrew – It was great meeting you at Masterclass here in Toronto! Thanks again for a truly mind-blowing seminar!
Keep up the good work!
-Luke
MarcusTJL
Yea! Can’t wait to watch it tonight and then listen to the podcast tomorrow.
Thanks!
Aaron Ludwig
Awesome stuff. Can’t wait for part two.
Thanks so much for sharing!
Toy Story 3 Preview | StevyGee’s Blog
[...] Auf Spline Doctors gibt es einen kleinen Podcast mit den Animatoren, wer also etwas aus deren Perspektive hören will, [...]
MargaretEI
Thank goodness I’m not the only one intimidated by step-key! When I read about it, it makes sense but in practice it feels like trying to tap dance in stilts.
Great splinecast (can’t wait for part 2!), and I’ll join the chorus saying TS3 totally exceeded my already high expectations. I loved the characters and story (and the telling!), and was amazed at how little perfect details deepened the experience of watching the movie. I get such a crazy joy spark whenever Woody runs (he almost runs like a toy would “run” with a child holding him off the ground). And Buzz’s (and Jessie’s) dancing! Loved that it led to dancing in the office (and file cabinet hopping to simulate the toilet jump = awesome. That scene felt right on).
Speaking of great moments in movement from TS3: Mr. Potatohead 2.0 was just… totally my happening and totally freaked me out. Hope it gets discussed in Part 2! Was it a total mind-blower to animate?
Oh, and the short Day & Night helped me cross a bold new frontier of dorkiness. I cried during it. I don’t even think I can blame that on reading up on oil spill related stuff, or anything else. I just got drawn in by the 2D/3D blend and the fun and apparently you guys are my kryptonite.
Possibly silly vocabulary questions:
Is “plussing” a scene standard movie/film lingo or just shop talk for making something “more better”?
Is “jankiness” a Pixarism, old animation term, or a regular word? I first heard it in the Wall•E making of clip (when describing the bomb-sniffing robot… Angus MacLane, maybe?) and it seems like a perfect word for that sort of movement (like in the movie scene discussed in the splinecast, when Wall•E reaches out for Eve’s hand in his for the first time).
“Jank” has tiny entry in my condensed OED (and some NSFW-ish ones online): obscured Norse or Swedish dialect meaning to totter or stall, which kinda grasps it, I guess, but both of the example sentences seem to be used in the “stall” sense. “Jankiness” just seem like such a perfect animation term, and particularly perfect for Pixar animation. Are there other words like that that animators use to describe certain movements?
Oh, and the “women doing the hand to chest thing when they talk on film but not in real life” note… good note. I’m female yet that never struck me as odd. But I now realize I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone (adult male or female) do that when they talk, and would probably be weirded out if they did. Maybe it’s a temptation based on the way talking head scenes are framed?
Anyways, great podcast for a movie I love more than I can say (I laughed, I cried, I reflected, I felt like someone had picked out the best stories in Borges’ infinite library to read to me before bed, I considered tango lessons, and I hummed the Spanish version of “We Belong Together” on the way out). Thank you!
Daniel Huertas
After a long animation/inspiration breakdown, thanks Pixar for getting rid of it, and like yesterday, TS3 gave me all what i needed to get back into business!! loved the spanish beats i found in there hehehe
great share Andrew!
James Nethery
Toy Story 3 was INCREDIBLE. I went to see it last night for the second time with some friends of mine (who also happen to work with me on the animated films for my website) and we were all falling out of our chairs when Spanish Buzz came on the scene. The animation when Buzz was dancing around Jessy was a-freakin-mazing. When I get the DVD I’m definitely going to be still framing through that!! Cudos to Carlos and anyone else who worked on those shots!
Great podcast. I’m going to give it a second listen today since the film is so fresh in my mind.
Okay… enough geeking out… I’m gonna go animate something now…
saurabh
Hat’s off to all the wonderful people who worked on TS3. It was amazing, I was in tears when andy was giving woddy to molly for safe keeping.
TS3 was the best 3d animated film for me. Cant wait for the roundtable part 2. special thanks to all the animtors who shared their views and ideas on the fantastic film.
Attila Szigeti
Looking forward to the next part!
Victor Luo
I saw TS3 in Solana Beijing, Wonderful! Although I expect alot on it, TS3 still beyond my expectation. Every touch, every details, even the ending titles shots still gorgeous! I was too excited that I hold my GF arm during the whole movie till she pain to cry
Can’t wait for the next part of the splinecast! Hat off for Doug, Andrew, Aaron, Victor, Carlos, Mike Venturini, Dave, Scott and ALL of you for making the best animated movie ever made!
Kyle Maloney
“I was in tears when andy was giving woddy to molly for safe keeping.”
Huh? That never happened…
Anyway, loved part one, the wait for the next one is killing me, it ended to abruptly.
Dorian Soto
Great post. I especially thought it was cool to have animators from so many different backgrounds sharing their experience on the same film.
Thanks for taking the time to discuss your experiences. Can’t wait to check out Part 2.
peterdriscoll
This is awesome!! Please please upload the next part, I can’t handle the anticipation!
peterdriscoll
. . also wanted give the splinedoctors a big thank you for doing these splinecasts for us!
pete
Dasof
Btw: the podcast rss feed isn’t working and hasn’t been working for months. Would be cool if you could get around and fix it.
seanwickett
howdy, looks like i’m not the only one having trouble with the feed.
itunes tells me that it can’t find the file on your server. pleeease, can you look into this? thanks!
cheers,
sean