The Reel Rejects - INSIDE OUT 2 FIRST 30 MINUTES REACTION + PIXAR Animation Studio Visit!!

Starting point is 00:00:00 Make your next vacation unforgettable. On Royal Caribbean's newest ship, Star of the Seas. It's everything you've loved about every family vacation you've ever been on, with mind-flowing thrills at the largest water park at sea, seven onboard pools for every level of chill, more than 40 ways to dine and drink, and even more to enjoy, at our award-winning private island, perfect day at Cocoa. This is the new Star of the Seas.

Starting point is 00:00:27 Click or tap the banner to find out more. On WhatsApp, no one can see or hear your personal messages. Whether it's a voice call, message, or sending a password. To WhatsApp, it's all just this. So whether you're sharing the streaming password in the family chat or trading those late-night voice messages that could basically become a podcast, your personal messages, stay between you, your friends, and your family. No one else, not even us.

Starting point is 00:00:57 WhatsApp, message privately with everyone. Introducing the new Volvo Xc90 with seven-seat versatility, Google built-in, and advanced safety features for all your precious cargo. The new Volvo XC90, designed for life. Visit volvocars.com slash us to learn more. Aloha gang. It is Donald here once again. Forgive my bedraggled little setup.

Starting point is 00:01:24 I am fresh off a plane and things are under construction, so we're doing our best here in the corner. But yes, I just returned from a trip to none other than the Pixar Animation Studio in Emeryville, California, just outside San Francisco, the fog, where they showed us the first two and a half hours of Inside Out 2. Just kidding. But they did show us about a half hour and change, so, you know, a pretty substantial glimpse at the film to come, essentially Act 1. And it was accompanied by, in the larger sense, a surprisingly in-depth view into the day-to-day goings on at the studio. And the numerous departments in hands the films travel through on their way to us. They walked us through a number of the different phases these films go through from scripting and design up through the different layers of animation to the finished edit.

Starting point is 00:02:09 And it was quite illuminating and more than anything, it just gave me a renewed appreciation and sense of admiration for the medium of animation in general, regardless of what specific movie, you know, we're talking about. You know, just the process alone was fascinating to behold, especially the way it exists now in the year 2024. But on the specific topic of Inside Out, I am a huge fan of the first film. It's definitely an upper tier Pixar for me. And due to that, I've been both excited to a degree, but also anxious about the prospect of a sequel. So in a way, there was a fair amount riding on this for me just as a fan and a viewer. While it's still fresh in my mind, I figured I'd go over the basics of what we saw, share a few thoughts on that, and then just give a glimpse into the overall experience.

Starting point is 00:02:52 You know, leak some Disney secrets, get the channel shut down. I was also lucky enough to be able to speak with director Kelsey Mann, as well as producer Mark Nielsen, about the process of bringing the film to life and some of the new ideas they wanted to incorporate. So keep an eye out in May for the second half of this video. Subscribe to the channel if you haven't already. And also, while you're out, go ahead and leave a like on this video so that we keep getting to do kind of neat stuff like this.

Starting point is 00:03:14 We don't do them too often, but when they happen, they're quite a blast. So, yeah, I don't know. If you like it, let us know. But for now, what was it? in that footage. Well, Inside Out, too, as you've probably seen from the trailers, brings us back to the inner world of young Riley as she's crashing into the next phase of her life, young adulthood, puberty. But also just a time in a lot of people's lives where, you know, you're starting to experience your first major set of life-altering changes from both the outside and inside. Friends going away, schools changing, you know, the friction between the goofy fun of kiddom versus the call toward maturity and being exposed to older kids. They've zeroed. it in here on the motif of Riley as an avid hockey player, which makes for a really punchy opening, as well as a few, you know, fun and exuberant sports action sequences, at least based on what we saw. We reconnect with her parents a little bit before she and her friends are headed off to

Starting point is 00:04:05 camp, which presents a nice sort of narrative crossroads through which the, you know, aforementioned themes, I assume, are going to flow. And just as the external world is bringing in all sorts of changes, so too is Riley experiencing change within her, you know, core setup of emotions and that little control center that they exist in within her brain. We check back in with joy, sadness, anger, fear, and disgust with about two-thirds of the voice cast remaining swapping out Bill Hader's fear for Tony Hale. Forky! As well as Mindy Kaling's disgust for Liza Lapira, I hope I'm saying your name correctly.

Starting point is 00:04:34 We get a brief check in on Riley's growth between the first film and now before things take a turn as all of a sudden new emotions begin to crop up, and the literal makeup of Riley's headspace begins to change as renovations are made to accommodate these new ideas and experiences. There's a pretty fun motif with a construction crew that comes in. And it's here where we meet the sort of main harbinger of these new emotional flavors, that being Maya Hawks' anxiety. Not her anxiety in particular. Playing anxiety, you get one I mean.

Starting point is 00:05:03 And from the get, you know, anxiety presents itself most prominently, but we also get a look at Onwee, envy, and embarrassment. Excellent alliteration there. Not an emotion, but, you know, just a great literary concept. And the first thing that struck me watching this footage is the movie really does hit the ground running, at least in the current form that these first 30 minutes existed in. The opening moments moved pretty quickly to reestablish the world and set the overall story in motion.

Starting point is 00:05:27 That was maybe taken a little back at first just by how quickly things kick off. It, like I said, definitely hits the ground running. Although it didn't take me too long to slide into the rhythm of the movie and for, I think, the movie to, you know, find its space to breathe, especially, you know, once the basics are nailed down and we're able to actually embark upon the story, you know, that's when the rich stuff really started to present itself.

Starting point is 00:05:47 And without giving too much away, it does seem like they have centered around a pretty conscientious concept for how to continue this story and, dare I say, franchise. In a way that does make a lot of sense and that I imagine that you could theoretically return

Starting point is 00:06:04 to an update for different walks of life, different ages, generations, et cetera, and the emotional nuances that accompany them. You could check in with Riley in her 20s, in her 30s, and her 40s. Of the new characters, we get the most comprehensive look at anxiety, who seems like she'll essentially be the sort of counterpart to joy out of these new emotional figures.

Starting point is 00:06:24 And again, big props to Maya Hoc, you know, it can always go either way in terms of getting a big name to be a voiceover in an animated feature. However, I thought that just the energy of her performance on the mic combined with the animation made for a very fun, funny, and anxiety-inducing character that I have to imagine a lot of people are going to latch on to simply because we live in a day and age that is so self-conscious and anxiety-ridden. We also spend a bit more time in the real world, or at least what felt like a bit more time in the real world, with Riley and her friends. And from what I understand, they, I guess, assembled like an actual coterie of friends and family within this age bracket and walk of life to sort of, you know, confer with over the many years making the movie to sort of, you know, nail down the authenticity of how these girls behave and what they're like when they're together versus around, you know, again, new people, older kids, etc. And at least from what we saw, you know, the actual Riley of it all felt quite natural and, you know, was goofy in appropriate places, but also angsty in appropriate places. And the animation is really lovely as well. I mean, obviously Pixar is a high standard, but just the textures and the different design choices, especially in the expansions they have made to Riley's mindscape. There's a lot of very interesting and kind of beautiful, cosmic, awe-inspiring imagery at points.

Starting point is 00:07:44 And they had a lot of concept art up on the walls while we were there and stuff like that. And even just things that were like designed as elements of inspiration that wouldn't necessarily even make like the cut of the movie. And yeah, like there's a lot of interesting juju, you know, that they've infused this new iteration of Riley's life with and personified her headspace with. And as the adventure ensues, we also get some surprising collisions into different animation styles and touchstones. Again, I don't want to go too deep into spoilers. But Lance and Bluffy, just keep an eye out for those two. Very standout characters, at least in our screening. So what we essentially got to see was Act 1 for Riley, shipping off to camp,

Starting point is 00:08:23 being presented with a whole new set of prospects and people and changes. And then also, you know, how her emotions are coping with this, both within the paradigm of the ones we're familiar with from the first one, as well as the new ones who are being presented to us now. There's the main four. There could be more. I don't know. They said that they had so many.

Starting point is 00:08:42 And for the first film as well, they had so many additional ones that they had to pare down. So I can't imagine there won't be some sort of surprise lurking. But overall, yeah, this got me optimistic, certainly, for what's to come. Again, like the prospect of following up inside out, you know, is a hefty task just because, you know, I feel like a lot of people would claim that as, you know, a pretty beloved Pixar joint or at least one that makes the higher rank in a lot of people's lists. But this gave me cautious optimism, you know, I feel like we could. they play their cards, right, or at least deliver on the promise that this first 30 minutes gave us, they could easily have something that is just as touching and fun and impactful and that gets at some grander ideas as Pixar films or want to do. Yeah, overall, I thought there was some

Starting point is 00:09:27 promising stuff in the glimpse that they showed us here, and now it's just up to them to deliver on the other two-thirds of the movie, which, you know, I certainly have faith they can do, so fingers crossed. As for the rest of our Pixar journey, as I mentioned before, they gave us a fascinating sort of cross-section of the years-long process it takes to develop and shape a film like this. First off, the campus is beautiful and imaginative in its construction. It really feels like the kind of place you'd want to come to work at. They have, like, customized, set-designed little offices in certain areas. They have a proprietary cafe. Tons of characters adorning the various halls and grounds. And the main bulk of what we were there to do was sort of this rotation of, again,

Starting point is 00:10:08 different deep dives into the roles of certain departments. So they started my group off with a virtual set scout, which was pretty mind-blowing. I got to say, like the way, again, technology has advanced is wild, especially in the realms of how far like virtual camera and environments have come. They literally had this rig that was like a fancy iPad that you could use essentially like a real camera and you could walk around, you could tilt and pan and all sorts of stuff, you could change lenses, and, you know, it would essentially approximate a real camera behaving in this fully, you know, digitally rendered environment, complete with things that aren't

Starting point is 00:10:44 even in the actual movie, but they exist in the set. So instead of it feeling, like it is all in a computer still, but instead of it feeling like that, you know, it really gives this sort of unique and interesting tangibility that, you know, as someone with a little bit of cinematography experience, you know, is exciting to think about because, you know, again, you think of these movies being animated all by, you know, people clicking mice at computers when at least in some capacities you can, like, design a real shot in a similar fashion to the way you might do it with a real camera in a real physical space. It just really, like, added a layer of tangibility that I wasn't aware of nor expecting. This is a fascinating technology and a really cool way to sort of bridge the gap between more traditional filmmaking and, you know, animated filmmaking.

Starting point is 00:11:31 Next, they took us to an animation polish review in which a handful of the animation team essentially get together in a little, you know, lounge area and take a look. at, you know, mostly rendered scenes, sort of sketching their notes over top of them and then shipping them out to the different individual animators to be applied and adjusted. So, again, like, not just dragging and clicking, but, you know, real drawings happening in real time and people kind of looking over what makes the scene funny or what improves, you know, a dramatic beat or, you know, any number of things. Then from there, we got to do a character design session, which was led by Jason Deemer, who's the production designer as well as Keiko Morayama, who is the,

Starting point is 00:12:08 I believe, character designer. And there they essentially just broke down their guiding design principle and philosophy for the emotion-based characters in particular, and then had us all basically engaged in one big drawing session where we pulled emotions from a hat and got to basically apply those principles to our own designs. I pulled silly, so that's my little silly, my take on silliness as, again, filtered through their rule of choosing a distinct shape and a distinct color. I figured, you know, spirals are kind of fun, you know, they're bouncy, they're springy,

Starting point is 00:12:42 and, you know, you can do a little, like, lopsided eyes, and you can turn this end into hair and stuff like that. He's got a little goofy little shoe. Y'all can let me know in the comments how well I did, you know, how well I understood the assignment or not. But I'm pretty proud of this thing, all right? So, if Pixar, if you're watching this and you want to steal, go right ahead. I won't be mad. I'll be pretty flattered, actually. Pixar hit me up.

Starting point is 00:13:07 But, yeah, those are just a few of the things we can. got to experience during our time on the Pixar campus. It was fascinating to say the least. There's actually more of this that I'm going to share with you guys, but this seems like a good place to stop for now. So tune back in in May for our chat with the director and the producer, as well as more tales from the Pixar campus. There is more stuff that we got to glimpse.

Starting point is 00:13:27 There are more departments we got to see sort of a day in the life of. Again, if you're an animation fan at all, this stuff was such a fascinating thing to behold. And yeah, I can't wait to see. see how the movie turns out. So yeah, leave me your thoughts on any and all of this. And we'll catch you next time. Much love.

Starting point is 00:13:44 And, yeah, cheers. Be well.

Your Ad Here

The Reel Rejects - INSIDE OUT 2 FIRST 30 MINUTES REACTION + PIXAR Animation Studio Visit!!

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.