The Next Generation And Start to Finish PIXAR’s Production Pipeline #Cars3Event

We had an amazing – magical – opportunity to visit the PIXAR Studios and meet with all the department heads who have been leading the process and creation of the upcoming Disney • Pixar CARS 3 and the Next Generation of animation. What we take as a given when watching any animation, involves a tireless work and dedication to the process of many people. CARS 3 had 263 people working on on it for the past three years. With this post, I’d like you to take a peak into some amazing elements of story animation and production pipeline that have happened during the making of CARS 3.

CARS 3 will be a very different installment that involves the characters that we are familiar with, like Lightening McQueen and Mater, with the newly added characters that bring life and an interesting twist into Lightening’s life.

One of the important issues that the designer team had to deal with was brining all characters to life. All elements, all looks and colors have to feel tangible to pull us, movie goers, into the the world of CARS 3. To create such relatable material that produces emotions and feeling takes a special type of crew! Jude Brownbill, the Directing Animator, Jay Shuster, Production Designer, and Michael Comet, Character Supervisor, had to work closely every day to develop new characters, refurbish the old ones, and bring in the elements of wonder, surprise and nostalgia to different scenes.

Jay Shuster is At His Computer Corner

Jay Shuster shared with us some of the challenges they encountered as a team building new characters into the story. Jackson Storm, the next generation car that would be a challenge to Lightening McQueen, was given a more square and grounded look that represent mass and muscle and strength. They consulted the professionals from Daytona 500 if their prototypes were good to represent a new generation car. The idea for McQueen was to keep him on a softer and more feeling side of the story.

Jude Brownbill the Animator

The challenge that Jude Brownbill was working with is something we, as people, can relate to. She was sharing how important it was to give all animation details the emotionally grounded and believable look. Take, for example, that 700-pound car and move it across sceneries like racetracks, wooded areas, mud and more.

The most important things that any animator can tackle with success are the look, the movement and the behavior of different animation elements and characters. You will see for yourself how successfully it has been done by the PIXAR animation teams.

Michael Comet, Characters Supervisor

What we do not know is how much work goes into character animation. Using a special rendering software, the characters were created and re-created hundreds of time during the production period. Actually, different tweaks were made until the last minute before the movie was closed and scent for production.

Take a look at the progression art and how the characters went through their transformation: from paper onto the animation graphics.

Story Is The King

It’s been emphasized again and again that Story Is King at PIXAR. That is why all illustrators, animators, tech crew work around the story and with the story. Every time one element of the story shifts or changes completely, that means all crew members have to go back to the already created slates and animation and introduce that changed to their part of expertise.

Bobby Podesta, Supervising Animator

What Bobby Podesta has been doing is supervising all the departments and coordinating any and all changes of the entire animation process. I don’t know how he could do it, as there are millions tiny details that he had to keep in his head and communicate to different people and department heads.

The Final Race – Who Is The Winner?

One of the biggest challenges presented by CARS 3 was to create and deal with… mud. Yes, that regular mud that’s under our feet. Animators had to learn how to direct that mud, how to make it not too hard, not liquid, but just right.

Jon Reisch, Effects Supervisor

Jon Reisch and his team are responsible for all the effects for all natural phenomena like water, fire, smoke, sand, dust and debris, and everything and anything that characters interact with in their rich and complex environment. To use his words, they work in the department where the rubber meets the road.

There are a lot of scenes where the races use mud and dust and fumes. Jon Reich’s goal was to create a moving mud, a moving dust cloud, tangible fumes. All natural elements come alive on a big screen. Before going to see the CARS 3 on June 16th, do watch again CARS and CARS 2 if you have your DVDs at home. You will notice a crucial difference how magnificent that mud and dust and fumes are in CARS 3. It is ART and SKILL joined together to recreate scenes that are relatable to us, humans.

Michael Fong, Supervising Technical Director

Again, I was amazed how the entire PIXAR culture is centered around the STORY.

“It [story] affects all the departments, including technical ones, in different but significant ways. Everything that Bobby’s animators do and Jon’s effects artists do is in alignment with the storytelling. Without tangible realism we’re not doing the best storytelling. Story takes a lot of time…but our movie needs to be in theaters on June 16.” – MICHAEL FONG

Follow Cars 3 Zooming Through Time & Spaces
Every Race of the Way!

Opens JUNE 16, 2017

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