A Tribute to John Lasseter, Part 3

After discussing the history of Pixar and its shorts, John then discussed Pixar's foray into feature-length films.  

For each feature, John made sure to include a short in front, so that the general audience could enjoy them as well as Siggraph attendees. This was also a great way to showcase the new technologies being developed there. They do the circuit of the animation festivals each year with them, as well. It helps them to keep in touch with the animation world outside of the studio, and lets people in to the "wonderful world of animators who are artists who labor over these gems."

The medium of computer animation changed what John got excited about with art:  when he was a student of classical pencil animation, his interest was focused on drawings. He'd study the pencil drawings of the masters and look for the movement captured in the lines there. With computer animation, he began to study paintings, observing the lighting and placement of objects in a more realistic environment. He'd study the works of Grant Wood, de La Tour, Rembrandt; he'd observe the translucency of a candle flame, then go back to his computer and puzzle over some of the problems he noticed there: everything looked like plastic, for instance.  

There had to be a way around it...how about using it to push the story? He loved toys, and the concept of toys being alive. If computer animation looked like plastic, well, then, he'd have plastic main characters. Once he'd gotten the okay from Disney to do a film, he decided he didn't want to do the basic Disney Modern Classic Musical Formula, where there's a main character, a villain, a love interest, and a goofy sidekick. He thought a Buddy Picture might work, like Midnight Run or The Odd Couple; it's funny, there's emotion, and characters grow and change. It was pretty easy to work out a plot for a buddy pic with toys: the old toy is the child's favorite: at first, they went with a Charlie McCarthy-type ventriloquist dummy, and had Tin Toy, from the Pixar short, be the shiny new toy, "Tinnie". But Tinnie wasn't a modern toy, and kids love action figures. John loved Star Wars, NASA, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Astronauts. The coolest thing ever, he said, was seeing the Astronauts come walking out toward the tower, holding their suitcases and wearing their helmets. (It's in Monsters, Inc.) 

They needed to think of a name for their Space Guy Action Figure, and discussed cool names in meetings: Vermorth? No. Takor? Nope. They wanted a space term. "Lightyear" Yeah! That's Cool! Astronauts....oh, the coolest name there is: Buzz Aldrin, the astronaut! "OOH! Buzz Lightyear! OOH!"

Bud Luckey suggested that they make the ventriloquist dummy a cowboy from the fifties. In the best buddy pics, the protagonists are as opposite as possible. Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier, for instance, or Felix and Oscar. But there were similarities with Buzz and Woody that contributed to their appeal: they were both classic American heroes that explored new frontiers, one the Wild West, the other Outer Space.