Steve Jobs and Pixar vs. Disney

Started by Jeremy Blackman, February 10, 2003, 05:56:32 PM

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Kal

yep... steve jobs is a genius... innovator... liberator... whatever you want

but he is also too arrogant... and that can be bad if he has more power.

Reinhold

he's made so much money by letting other people use his products to express themselves. i don't think it's likely that he'll do any worse for disney than disney would do without him.
Quote from: Pas Rap on April 23, 2010, 07:29:06 AM
Obviously what you are doing right now is called (in my upcoming book of psychology at least) validation. I think it's a normal thing to do. People will reply, say anything, and then you're gonna do what you were subconsciently thinking of doing all along.

Tictacbk

Well its official...7.4 Billion in stock later Steve Jobs now rules the world.


LOS ANGELES - The Walt Disney Co. said Tuesday it is buying longtime partner Pixar Animation Studios Inc. for $7.4 billion in stock in a deal that could restore Disney's clout in animation while vaulting Pixar CEO Steve Jobs into a powerful role at the media conglomerate.

Disney's purchase of the maker of the blockbuster films "Toy Story and "Finding Nemo" would make Jobs Disney's largest shareholder. Jobs, who owns more than half of Pixar's shares and also heads Apple Computer Inc., will also join Disney's board.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11003466/

Gold Trumpet

A year ago, my best friend was awarded an internship at Pixar. He's a digital cinema major with an emphesis on animation. The internship was to begin in 2007. Then 4 months ago he got a personal phone call from Brad Bird (dir. of Incredibles) saying after the year long internship he was already guranteed a job that would start him at $270,000 a year. He was estatic and kept telling me how crazy Bird was on the phone.

When Disney bought out Pixar, he was told all promises made to him by Pixar were now down the drain because of the buy out. He was told he had to re-apply but he couldn't use any of his projects because they were now the property of Pixar. They were made property of Pixar because when he first applied for the internship he had to sign them over to Pixar.

Now he's basically in the gutter and forced to start over.

matt35mm

That.  Really sucks balls.

Give your friend a hug for me.  Jesus.  The $270,000 phone call from Brad Bird... and now it's gone.

Is that application the only way to get hired as an intern?  I mean, if Brad Bird or anyone else at Pixar (which still owns and can witness his, I'm sure, impressive work) remembers him... I dunno, I just hope for the best for him, because he sounds extremely talented and deserving of it.

Reinhold

Disney-Pixar to Adapt "The Bicycle Thief"

Set in 2007, this new spin on the time-honored Italian classic will follow the life of an intern-to-be in a modern world of broken promises.  No details have yet been confirmed, though intial buzz indicated that Brad Bird had signed on. Stay tuned for updates.
Quote from: Pas Rap on April 23, 2010, 07:29:06 AM
Obviously what you are doing right now is called (in my upcoming book of psychology at least) validation. I think it's a normal thing to do. People will reply, say anything, and then you're gonna do what you were subconsciently thinking of doing all along.

Gold Trumpet

Quote from: matt35mm on February 07, 2006, 04:30:56 AM
That.  Really sucks balls.

Give your friend a hug for me.  Jesus.  The $270,000 phone call from Brad Bird... and now it's gone.

Is that application the only way to get hired as an intern?  I mean, if Brad Bird or anyone else at Pixar (which still owns and can witness his, I'm sure, impressive work) remembers him... I dunno, I just hope for the best for him, because he sounds extremely talented and deserving of it.

They obviously realize his predicament. Its just contracts and legalities of the situation overrule any chance for reconsideration.

He does have one small glimmer of hope. He works at a television station and Disney lately has been buying out a lot of television stations. Representatives for Disney visited his TV station last week in consideration to buy it. If they did buy it he'd be an employee of Disney and in better standing for a potential reconsideration.

Reinhold

Quote from: Pas Rap on April 23, 2010, 07:29:06 AM
Obviously what you are doing right now is called (in my upcoming book of psychology at least) validation. I think it's a normal thing to do. People will reply, say anything, and then you're gonna do what you were subconsciently thinking of doing all along.

Gold Trumpet

Quote from: Xidentity Crixax on February 24, 2006, 07:51:27 PM
hey gt, any news on your friend?

Sorry I missed this. Anyways, news is he's stuck without a rope to cling to. He still has to submit an entire new batch of projects to Pixar and is in the middle of being expelled from the university he was attending for digital cinema. The expulsion is not related to performance. The explusion fucks him though because the unversity provided the equipment and trainining necessary to make the projects. He has a littany of excuses that keeps him from really trying and has accepted the idea he may be stuck in television for life. The TV station he does work for has connections to ESPN so he can somewhat still move up.

Reinhold

Quote from: The Gold Trumpet on March 13, 2006, 05:32:24 AM
Quote from: Xidentity Crixax on February 24, 2006, 07:51:27 PM
hey gt, any news on your friend?

Sorry I missed this. Anyways, news is he's stuck without a rope to cling to. He still has to submit an entire new batch of projects to Pixar and is in the middle of being expelled from the university he was attending for digital cinema. The expulsion is not related to performance. The explusion fucks him though because the unversity provided the equipment and trainining necessary to make the projects. He has a littany of excuses that keeps him from really trying and has accepted the idea he may be stuck in television for life. The TV station he does work for has connections to ESPN so he can somewhat still move up.

he should get in touch with steve Jobs directly... and do something ballsy, like digitally animating a video of him having a conversation with steve Jobs in which they make a wager that if Jobs gives him a job, he'll guarantee that he'll earn his salary back for Jobs, and if he doesn't, he'll work for free until he does. but if he does turn a profit for Jobs, he gets a contract to stay.
Quote from: Pas Rap on April 23, 2010, 07:29:06 AM
Obviously what you are doing right now is called (in my upcoming book of psychology at least) validation. I think it's a normal thing to do. People will reply, say anything, and then you're gonna do what you were subconsciently thinking of doing all along.

Gold Trumpet

The story continues...............


OK, more news. Very good news.

So, lately he has been working at the television station and just trying to get his life back in order. He was recently promoted to the job of a director at the TV station so now is making enough money where he doesn't have to go back to school. But, he got another call from Brad Bird. I guess Brad Bird really went to bat for him at a committee meeting with Pixar and forced the studio to offer him a job. Its very stunning because Bird already had all these other potential animators under his wing but yet went to bat for my friend because he was stuck without a rope to cling to. Thing is, it worked. Bird called him up and offered him a guranteed job of a 6 figure paycheck and all these other amenities.

The shocking part is my friend declined. He has two little girls and is trying to raise them while going through a divorce right now. The mother is very manipulative (she also hates me!!!) and he knows if he bails for California now that his girls will resent him for the rest of their lives. Plus, he has other things going for him. He recently directed a video for an unsigned punk band who's likely going to get airplay on Fuse TV if they win a contest. (they're already in the lead and name of band is Sore for Sunday) Also, for his original Pixar deal, he had to write an essay on his favorite animator. He chose Hayao Miyazaki and gave it to Pixar. Brad Bird sent that essay in to the New Yorker for an issue where they publish student essays. New Yorker actually chose to print his in an issue to be released later this year.

The great thing is he never wrote for anything before and I have some mutual friends who themselves are aspiring writers and know Tom and cannot believe the holiest of grails The New Yorker is publishing him. They know he's a first time writer and are crying injustice. I love it though! Even writing right now I am still giddy and happy for him. Then they also wonder how I can be so happy because he's getting published first and I'm not and everyone knows I sorta directed him to all his favorite filmmakers. I just think "Hell, if he's getting published for a filmmaker I introduced him to, all the more compliment to me."

But, my friend didn't completely turn down Bird. He said once his children are in school full time in 5 years he'll reconsider the offer. Bird told him to stay in touch and by that time Studio Ghibli may be looking for 3-D animators (I guess the company might be making a shift in animation output *hint hint*) for post production work and he should be at the front door for an excellent opportunity then. A job for Studio Ghibli would be a dream come true and I am nearly certain he won't pass that up when the time comes.


MacGuffin

Pixar's Got Spirit?     
Thursday, 02 February 2006

Now that they are masters of all they survey at Disney, the Pixar boys can pretty much do what they want with their movies. Well, they were doing that already, actually, but now they have the resources of the super-corporation that is Disney fully at their disposal. And some are speculating that could lead to an animated film version of the classic comic strip The Spirit, to be directed by The Incredibles helmer Brad Bird.

Kung Fu Rodeo is relaying an article by Time this week which hints at what's to come for Pixar beyond its next two films, Cars and Ratatouille. Speculation – and that's often all we fanboys have to go on – has it that Will Eisner's seminal comic could become a Pixar property.

"Little is known of future projects, but Incredibles auteur Brad Bird has long wanted to direct a noir-style film, possibly based on Will Eisner's comic The Spirit," the Time article says.

The story does not mention, however, the fact that comics writer Jeph Loeb was hired to write a feature film version of the strip last April. So Rumor Patrol will have to file this particular report under "wait and see" until less ghostly evidence appears on the matter.
"Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art." - Andy Warhol


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polkablues

Quote from: MacGuffin on June 09, 2006, 02:29:33 PM
an animated film version of the classic comic strip The Spirit, to be directed by The Incredibles helmer Brad Bird.

:shock:
Oh, dear lord.  I just stopped breathing.

That's the greatest thing I've ever heard.
My house, my rules, my coffee

MacGuffin

Disney/Pixar on mission for 'Mars' rights
Source: Hollywood Reporter

Disney/Pixar is in final negotiations to acquire the film rights to Edgar Rice Burroughs' novels known collectively as the "John Carter of Mars" series.

The 11-volume series began with the story titled "A Princess of Mars," published serially in All-Story magazine in 1912 and in novel form in 1916. Burroughs wrote it in longhand, and the original manuscript lies in a vault at a Bank of America in Tarzana, Calif., the town that takes its name from Burroughs' more famous creation, Tarzan.

The series told of a Civil War officer named John Carter who is transported to Mars and finds himself a captive of the savage green men from Thark. Carter eventually rises to become a great warrior, marries a princess, raises a family and embarks on numerous adventures.

Disney had the rights to the series through most of the 1990s, when Jeffrey Katzenberg wanted to adapt it as an animated feature. At one point, the project morphed into live action, and John McTiernan was involved as a director.

Paramount Pictures nabbed the rights to the series in 2002 with Jim Jacks and Sean Daniel as producers. The project was a revolving door for directors: Robert Rodriguez was going to do it before he resigned from the DGA over "Sin City," Kerry Conrad made a notable presentation when he was eyeing it as his follow-up to "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow," and Jon Favreau was attached before going off to do "Iron Man."

Sources said Paramount let go of "Mars" about a year ago, and it was without a home until about a month ago, when Pixar, under John Lasseter's direction, came calling out of the blue.

A representative of the Burroughs estate said the studio was acquiring the live-action rights for a possible tentpole franchise. However, sources at Disney believed "Mars" to be headed for animated adaptation.

Disney declined comment.
"Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art." - Andy Warhol


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MacGuffin



He Runs That Mickey Mouse Outfit
Source: New York Times

IT wasn't the first time John Lasseter, the director of "Toy Story" and "Cars," had sat through the screening of a not-quite-ready animated film. But when he saw an early cut of Disney's "Meet the Robinsons" last March, he watched it with a new eye. He wasn't just a fellow director, and a founder of Pixar Animation Studios. This time he was the boss, the chief creative officer of animation for the Walt Disney Company, which had agreed to acquire Pixar two months before.

As he sat in a dark theater on the first floor of Disney's animation studio here, something bothered him about the villain. Almost all of Pixar's animated movies had an evil foil. In "Toy Story" Buzz Lightyear and Woody escaped a cruel neighborhood bully. In "A Bug's Life" an ant saved his colony from a menacing grasshopper and his thuggish crew. By contrast the lanky villain in "Robinsons," the story of an orphan who builds a time machine in order to find his mother, was neither threatening enough nor scary.

After the screening Mr. Lasseter and his colleagues from Pixar and Disney met with the director, Stephen Anderson, and told him so. For six hours.

Ten months later Mr. Lasseter was back in the screening room, watching Mr. Anderson's new version of "Meet the Robinsons," which is set for release on March 30. Nearly 60 percent of the original film had been cut. A diabolical sidekick had been added. And in one thrilling scene the orphan, Lewis, is chased by an oversize dinosaur. Later, when asked about the movie's ending, Mr. Lasseter's rubbery smile turned upside down and he pretended to cry.

"The audience is going to be sobbing," he said, dragging his index fingers down his cheeks. "It is really going to get them."

A Hollywood outsider whose independent shop popularized computer animation, Mr. Lasseter, 50, might seem an odd fit for a studio built on old-school cartoons and the mythology of Snow White and Cinderella. But since Pixar was acquired, Mr. Lasseter has been heralded as a latter-day Walt Disney, a cultural arbiter who can rekindle the spirit of Disney's famous animation at its theme parks, on store shelves and in a theater near you.

Since the days of the 1928 Mickey Mouse classic "Steamboat Willie," animation was Disney's undisputed long suit. But after a recent decade-long parade of disappointments, most famously the 2002 bomb "Treasure Planet," the studio was desperate for a change of fortune. It abandoned its hand-drawn tradition in favor of computer-generated fare. In the process the keepers of the Magic Kingdom lost much of their cultural cachet.

Enter Mr. Lasseter who, along with a close team of handpicked animators had made Pixar this generation's premier storyteller with an unbroken string of hits including "Monsters, Inc.," "Finding Nemo" and "The Incredibles." The first filmmaker to run Disney's animation operations since Walt Disney died in 1966, he said he wants to reclaim the studio's golden era.

Since those early days, though, almost everything has changed. On the Disney campus, the creative culture is tattered still from years of cost-cutting and political infighting. And in the world at large audiences have moved on. The sweet wholesome tales of Mickey Mouse and friends don't have the same relevance for a generation raised on violent video games, distracted by 500 cable channels and preoccupied with Web diversions like MySpace.

"I'm not sure it's a trivial challenge," said Jim Morris, a Pixar producer who is working on the forthcoming "Wall-E." "As charismatic as John is, he can't do everything."

Long-time colleagues say the force that will guide the coming changes — to the studio's offices, to the films at the multiplex, to Christmas toys and rides that can make vacationing families queasy — is Mr. Lasseter's own unique sensibility. He gets his inspiration from real life — his own. "Cars," which lost the animated feature prize to "Happy Feet" at last Sunday's Oscars, was the byproduct of a cross-country road trip he took with his wife and five sons. The idea for "Toy Story 2" was hatched when his children sought to play with toys he stored in boxes. And the die-cast collectibles he had issued for "Cars" were similar to the Hot Wheels he played with growing up in Whittier, Calif., in the 1960s.

That said, his greatest test may be getting Disney's battle-worn animators to embrace the new culture he is trying to create while at the same time churning out a movie a year. "John doesn't really change," said Andrew Stanton, the director of Pixar's "Finding Nemo," who is a close friend and frequent collaborator. "People change around him."

MR. LASSETER rarely sits still. His hands dance and wave in the air in front of him as he rattles off ideas, a sometimes artful stream of consciousness that can range from the shape of a tree he saw that morning to the laws governing wheelchair ramps under the Americans With Disabilities Act. Even during a lunch interview at Disney's studios after several days of being shuttled between hourly meetings and nightly screenings, he is alert and focused.

How then, he was asked, did he plan to restore Disney animation's cultural prominence?

He seemed almost dumbstruck by the question. He sat mute for a moment then turned to two attentive publicists sitting close by, searching their faces for an answer.

"I don't know what to say," he uttered, sounding mildly annoyed. "I don't think like that. I trust in my instincts. I'm a product of what this company has created. I do what I do because of Walt Disney. Goofy. Mickey Mouse. I never forgot how their films entertained me. I also love my toys. My Hot Wheels, my G.I. Joes."

But of course he has a plan.

Mr. Lasseter and Edwin Catmull, a Pixar founder who was named president of the combined animation groups of Disney and Pixar and who oversees operations, have designs for a new headquarters in nearby Glendale. While the building will have Silicon Valley-style comfy couches, coffee stands and open spaces for animators to gather, it won't be a replica of Pixar's 16-acre campus in Emeryville, Calif., where artists play afternoon badminton games and executives zip between in-house meetings on scooters. "When we came to work here, we said Pixar is Pixar, Disney is Disney," Mr. Lasseter said. "We did not want to come here and turn it into Pixar."

Still, the cultural shift they are devising seems more like Pixar than not. For one thing, Mr. Lasseter and Mr. Catmull are encouraging animators to experiment more with their craft. For another, they hope to reintroduce hand-drawn movies. Simply put, the two do not want to see the art form lost. "One of the things I find distressing is that when money gets tight, the money for drawing dries up," Mr. Catmull said. "When people draw, they are learning to see."

Since taking over, Mr. Lasseter and Mr. Catmull have instituted a program to revive the hand-drawn animated short. "The whole purpose is to get these artists ready for feature films," Mr. Lasseter said.

The day after he won a Golden Globe for "Cars," Mr. Lasseter and 13 animation executives gathered in Story Room 1 on the second floor of the studio in Burbank to hear an art direction pitch for a new short film featuring Goofy titled "How to Hook Up Your Home Theater." On one wall were nine boards with images of Goofy drawn by Disney artists between 1942 and 1948. Looking at one image, Mr. Lasseter said: "What I love about Goofy is the flesh on his cheeks. You can almost feel it. That is something to make sure you have. Do the pupils have different shapes for expression?"

"Sometimes they change size," answered Dale Baer, an animator.

"I like it when they are a little bigger," Mr. Lasseter said.

"I love this stuff," he said later, reflecting on the 60-year-old Goofy drawings and the animation division's new logo, a short scene from "Steamboat Willie." "We want to look back and look forward at the same time. This stuff lasts forever, every single movie. 'Dumbo' gets me every time. That moment when, at the same time, their trunks are touching? Long after I am gone they will make audiences cry."

Mr. Lasseter talks a lot about making audiences cry. "John will go straight to as much emotion as possible," said Lee Unkrich, the director of the recently announced "Toy Story 3" from Pixar. "It can become sappy."

But as much as Buzz Lightyear had Woody, Mr. Lasseter has a creative foil in Andrew Stanton, whom Mr. Unkrich described as having "a more biting way." Mr. Unkrich said, "You never felt them slip sliding into something emotionally shallow." (Mr. Stanton has stepped into a leadership role at Pixar now that Mr. Lasseter spends two days a week in Burbank.)

"I am, by nature, an honest person," Mr. Lasseter said. "I wear my emotions on my sleeve. There is no 'behind closed doors' with me. It's the nature of Hollywood that there are the people in power and the people who tell them what they want them to hear. We choose to be honest and open."

So much so that Mr. Lasseter established a "story trust" at Disney, a mirror of the "brain trust" at Pixar where directors and story editors criticize a movie's flaws more than any filmgoer might. "They are not back-patting sessions," Mr. Catmull said. The six-hour meeting about "Meet the Robinsons" was one such session. Mr. Anderson later called it "one of the hardest days of my life."

Harder still for those animators who don't adapt. Chris Sanders, a longtime Disney animator who was a director and writer of the hit "Lilo and Stitch," had developed a movie called "American Dog," the tale of a Hollywood dog star who gets lost in the desert. Last year Mr. Lasseter and directors from both Pixar and Disney attended two screenings of the movie and gave Mr. Sanders notes on how he might improve the story, Mr. Unkrich said. Mr. Sanders resisted the suggestions, Mr. Lasseter said. So in January he was replaced by another director.

Asked about the episode, Mr. Lasseter abruptly interrupted an interview to confer with publicists, asking "What can I say here?"

After a brief discussion Mr. Lasseter explained that Pixar often added or replaced a director if a film needed help. "Chris Sanders is extremely talented, but he couldn't take it to the place it had to be," he said carefully.

Mr. Sanders, who is negotiating his exit from Disney, declined to comment. "John doesn't force his solutions on you," said Brad Bird, who directed "The Incredibles" and is close to Mr. Lasseter. "But that doesn't mean he is going to go quietly."

MR. LASSETER was born in Hollywood in 1957 and raised in nearby Whittier. His mother was an art teacher and his father a parts manager at a car dealership. After graduating from the prestigious California Institute of the Arts in 1979, Mr. Lasseter became a Disney animator for five years before joining Pixar in 1986. As a youth he was a ride operator on the Jungle Cruise at Disneyland. It remains a favorite.

In the early 2000s Disney's theme parks were derided for being shabbily maintained, and when Mr. Lasseter joined Disney, the chief executive, Robert Iger, made him a creative adviser to the theme parks, in part to oversee the quality of Disney's attractions.

"No jokes today," Mr. Lasseter said as he suppressed a smile halfway through a recent 8 a.m. meeting with a design team from Walt Disney Imagineering that was showing him a prototype of the new Toy Story Mania theme park ride based on "Toy Story." "I want to play!"

Toy Story Mania is a video-game-style attraction designed by Disney in which riders seated in moving cars earn points when they shoot targets on a 3D screen. Mr. Lasseter climbed into a makeshift seat propped up on a plywood platform and hunkered down, ready for a test run. As the design team yelled, "Go! Go! Go!," he concentrated, his tongue darting out the side of his mouth while his finger quickly grazed the trigger.

"I got a little confused as to which color was mine," said Mr. Lasseter as he climbed out of his seat after earning 32,500 points, 1,700 more than his opponent. When one executive suggested rewarding high scorers by having a treat like an ice cream cone or a cookie show up onscreen, he said, "I have a diabetic son, and I don't think we want to give food as a reward."

But what concerned him more was when he was told that an outsider had been hired to animate some of the characters on the screen, including Woody.

"Are we making the right decision to have the characters animated by another company?" he asked the game's designer, Sue Bryan. "I'm not comfortable with these people animating the characters, especially if we are dealing with Buzz Lightyear and that clear helmet and the reflection. We want to that to be right."

"We've got the groundwork laid," she replied.

Mr. Lasseter remained firm. He instructed a Pixar colleague, Roger Gould, to talk to the outside company. "I really want to control quality," he said. "I don't want outsiders rendering the characters."

Mr. Lasseter has an executive from Disney's consumer products division, Mary Beech, assigned to work with him on merchandising ideas.In addition to toys, he wants to expand Disney's offerings for adults. Pixar's coming film "Ratatouille" is about a rat named Remy who lives in a French restaurant and adores good food. That gave Mr. Lasseter an idea. "We had our people over to the kitchen of Thomas Keller at the French Laundry restaurant and we camcorded him cooking ratatouille," he told Ms. Beech when she stopped by the Burbank office recently. "Thomas Keller went nuts for Hanley china," he said, referring to the British china maker. "That got me thinking about the high end. It's really elegant, but slightly cartoony. Maybe we could do the same idea for china."

"Sur La Table is talking a real soup pot and ladle," Ms. Beech said, referring to the upscale gourmet cooking store.

"One of our favorite gifts we've given out at Christmas is the cheese of the month club," Mr. Lasseter said of himself and his wife, Nancy. "What if we used 'Ratatouille' to do that? What if we did with Costco the cheese of the month club? We could have Remy writing about cheeses. We could have an in-store display."

Ms. Beech smiled as two onlookers in the office laughed. Mr. Lasseter's notions about cheese and china sounded a little un-Disney-like.

But then again, maybe not. Disney recently announced a new line of wedding gowns inspired by Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella that sell for as much $2,900. And, as every wedding-goer knows, brides want new china too.
"Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art." - Andy Warhol


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