Toy story
Budget : $30 million
Production Duration : 4 years
Box office : $373.6 million as on Aug 20 2016. (Wikipedia)Softwares used : Marionette, Renderman
References:
https://blog.animationmentor.com/making-the-transition-from-2d-to3d-animation/ – Dave Burgess article- 2006Click to access Toy-Story1rLoRez.pdf
http://time.com/4118006/20-years-toy-story-pixar/
://medium.com/the-mission/the-story-behind-the-toy-storye660368bd0db
https://www.theverge.com/2015/3/17/8229891/sxsw-2015-toy-story-pixar-making-of-20th-anniversary
On January 19th, 1993, the collaboration between Disney and Pixar commenced production on the first CGI feature film, The Toy Story. History was to be made with this film and for Pixar, which was still a budding studio at the time, it meant a great deal to work with an establishment like Disney’s. Disney and Pixar made a $26 million deal to produce three movies together but to produce such a computer-animated, Full-feature film needed technology that didn’t exist during that time.
The solution to this problem was to create the hardware and software required to generate such a production. Along with coming up with good storylines, Pixar had to come up with the tools to make such a film.
“At that point, none of us knew what we were doing. We didn’t have any production expertise except for short films and commercials. So we were all complete novices. But there was something fresh about nobody knowing what the hell we were doing.” Ed Catmull, former software engineer and current Pixar and Disney Animation President.
On request from George Lucas to check out the work of Lucas film, Steve Jobs met Ed Catmull. According to his interview with Charlie Rose (1996), he says he was “Blown away” hearing Ed Catmull’s dream of creating a fully computer-generated feature film someday and wanted to be a part of that dream. That dream is what gave birth to Toy story almost 10 years later.
We have all seen this amazing production but to make such a feature and story that Disney approved was difficult. Some of the initial ideas never made it into the film. The initial idea was to create woody’s character as a bully. That was the hitch that almost made Disney pull out of its an agreement until Steve Jobs himself had to fund the next leg of production to make Woody lovable as he is until Disney got back on track.
Animation is not a one-person job. It takes a team of skilled people to make a feature. Steve Jobs, CEO of Pixar and co-founder of Apple industry, in his interview with Charlie Rose (1996) said “These are team sports, They are not something one person does. You have to have an extraordinary team, It is like you have to climb a mountain with a whole party of people, a lot of stuff to bring up the mountain. One person can’t do it.” Even with a lot of people working on the film, it took 4 years and a budget of $30 million for Toy Story to hit the large screen. When it finally did hit the screens, Toy story broke the box office with $373.6 million worldwide, giving Pixar the recognition and fame it deserved.
John Lasseter added (interviewer – Charlie Rose, 1996) “What excited me when I used computer animation for the first time in 1981 was that it was 3 Dimensional. We were able to create a world that was totally dimensional. We were able to move in and around objects, which you would have never been able to do in hand-drawn animation.”
Shraddha Mithinti 