Jay Shuster, Wielder of a Pixar Pencil

A) Talk to strangers – they’re not stealing your lunch money or climbing over you to be the next project lead (… I haven’t experienced this). The people are authentic, happy people (a rare breed in the tiny San Francisco bay area film circles). By the way, the “people in the lab coats” [i.e. the tech innovators] are your friends. They don’t wear lab coats but they do invent the software that makes the ghost flames rendered over metal flake paint look not-of-this-world.

B) Assert yourself – speak up, speak out, ask questions.


C) Play – research for these films is all about play. It is also essential to the process. People on Nemo went on that fabled scuba diving trip to Hawaii… The Cars project took numerous drives down Route 66 to take in the rich patina and history of the Mother Road. It’s play and it’s homework. You immediately know when someone hasn’t done their homework – you pick it up in the obscure details, in the overall proportion of things. Your eye knows when something is off. If you can’t relate to the minutia in a movie, it’s hard to focus one’s attention on that all-too-often-overlooked Story thing.


D) Educate yourself – keep an open mind. Pixar sponsors internal classes and pays for extracurricular.


E) Relax – you’re making cartoons. Really excellent cartoons. (… okay,we’re deadly serious about making extremely excellent cartoons.)