Collider Visits Pixar for the CARS 2 Press Day

A couple of months ago, Collider was invited to travel out to Emeryville, California to Pixar Animation Studios in order to take part in the Cars 2 press day. As one would expect, it was a pretty fantastic experience. We were privy to a number of presentations regarding all things Cars 2, given by the very people responsible for making the Pixar films we know and love.

In addition, we got the chance to sit down and interview quite a few of the people involved with the film including director John Lasseter, composer Michael Giacchino and actress Emily Mortimer, and we were given a tour of the Pixar building itself. Hit the jump to check out a full rundown of our visit. Cars 2 hits theaters June 24th.

We’ve been running our interviews from the press day once a week for the past couple of months, but for our last article we wanted to do a recap of sorts rounding out our visit to the studio. First up, the studio itself.

Pixar Tour

When we first arrived at the front gates of Pixar, just outside San Francisco, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of wonderment. I began running through all the incredible films the studio has released over the years and was a bit dumbfounded to find myself at the very place where they’re all created. When walking up to the front doors of Pixar, it’s obvious that this isn’t your typical workplace. In the middle of an outdoor lecture pavilion a group of employees were taking part in a yoga session, adjacent to a giant Luxo Jr. lamp and bouncy ball.

When you enter the front doors of the main building, you step into an enormous atrium. This area houses the café where all the employees eat, the mail room, the Pixar Studio Store and entrances to all the other areas of the studio. The building was designed to foster spontaneous meetings, so employees are encouraged to walk around throughout the hallways during the day.

Also at the front entrance is a glass trophy case housing all the awards that the studio has won. The large walls of the atrium are home to giant mattes made up of concept art from Pixar films, usually from whichever flick the studio is currently promoting. While we were there, gorgeous images from Cars 2 were on display.

pixar-atrium-cars-2-imageWhile at the studio, we were also given the opportunity to take a tour of the brand new building (deemed “Phase II”) that’s currently in the final stages of construction. What’s seen as the most significant development for Pixar since the studio first moved to Emeryville, Phase II is every bit as awe-inspiring as the main building. The centerpiece of its atrium is a giant hearth in the middle of the ground floor, with a chimney extending all the way up to the ceiling. A fire was lit, and a number of super comfy-looking couches were parked in front. However, something even cooler was just around the corner.

Our tour guide took us to the backside of the hearth and proceeded to explain to us that what makes the main building so special is that the artists and employees working there began carving out secret spaces, creating hidden bars throughout the building (yes, real bars, with alcohol and such). In keeping with this tradition, a bar has been created inside the hearth. A large black steel door swings open when prompted with the correct keycard (how many lucky employees will have one of these?), unveiling an incredibly cozy bar waiting to be stocked. There are couches inside, with a flat-screen television mounted on the wall. Our guide explained to us that this television will be hooked up to a camera on the roof, so whoever’s in the bar will have a perfect view of the San Francisco skyline just over the bay.

pixar-awards-case-imageIn addition to the gorgeous hearth, the new building also features a “healthy option” café, and Pixar characters made out of metal embedded into the floor/walls/ceiling hidden throughout the structure. We also saw some workers preparing to hang a giant matte of concept are from next summer’s Brave that looked stunning. Additionally, the new building features two new screening rooms/movie theaters. Presently, the main Pixar building houses one screening room that can comfortably hold a good deal of people. In the Phase II building, they’ve built one slightly smaller screening room, and one significantly larger screening room. These theaters’ projector systems are wired to be able to project material sent from any computer on campus, so when teams are viewing and critiquing dailies or a short rendering, they don’t even have to bring their computer.

All-in-all, Pixar Animation Studios is pretty much the perfect workplace. The buildings’ designs foster creativity and fun, leading to employees actually choosing to stay late and work.

cars-2-movie-image-01Cars 2 Presentations

The reason we were all at Pixar in the first place was in anticipation of the studio’s 12th feature film.. We were given presentations by producer Denise Ream, production designer Harley Jessup, director of photography/lighting Sharon Calahan, composer Michael Giacchino, Cars franchise guardian Jay Ward and many more. Here are a few interesting tidbits we gleaned from these presentations:

-The idea was to do a sort of genre shift from the first Cars, intending to make the film a little more sophisticated, but still enjoyable for all audiences.

-30 car companies agreed to let Pixar use the likeness/brands in the film.

cars-2-movie-image-The idea of casting Bruce Campbell as one of the voices came from some of the animators.

-The character of Finn McMissile (voiced by Michael Caine) was originally supposed to appear in Cars. During the drive-in sequence in that film, the movie that was going to be showing was first imagined as a spy movie, with a car named Finn McMissile as the hero. The movie-within-a-movie was eventually changed, but they liked the McMissile character so much that they revisited the idea when developing Cars 2.