This is a TEDtalk by Pixar mainstay writer/director Andrew Stanton. Though not strictly about Pixar it delves into the mind of a writer of Toy Story (1995), A Bug’s Life (1998), Monsters Inc. (2001), Finding Nemo (2003), and Wall·E (2008) amongst others, offering interesting insights into the creative process at Pixar as opposed to the Steve Jobs/business aspect that is often discussed. (If you’re interested in that, they do a pretty good job summarizing it themselves. Here)
“We didn’t have any influence then, so we had a little secret list of rules that we kept to ourselves. And they were: No songs, no “I want” moment, no happy village, no love story. And the irony is that, in the first year, our story was not working at all and Disney was panicking. So they privately got advice from a famous lyricist, who I won’t name, and he faxed them some suggestions. And we got a hold of that fax. And the fax said, there should be songs, there should be an “I want” song, there should be a happy village song, there should be a love story and there should be a villain. And thank goodness we were just too young, rebellious and contrarian at the time. That just gave us more determination to prove that you could build a better story. And a year after that, we did conquer it. And it just went to prove that storytelling has guidelines, not hard, fast rules.”
Overall he discusses a number of points addressing the need to be confident in your decisions and your character’s decisions, to have a relationship with your audience, and to be honest with them and your subject matter.
“…And the idea is that the character has an inner motor, a dominant, unconscious goal that they’re striving for, an itch that they can’t scratch,” He says. “Wall-E’s was to find the beauty. Marlin’s, the father in “Finding Nemo,” was to prevent harm. And Woody’s was to do what was best for his child. And these spines don’t always drive you to make the best choices. Sometimes you can make some horrible choices with them.”
He strives to make it clear that these thoughts can result in happy characters as well as horrible characters, the idea being simply based on how those characters go about it.
He concludes with the idea of drawing from what you know, and to utilize that honesty to express yourself as purely as possible.
Animation: Critical Perspectives 