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More details on Quora: https://www.quora.com/Pixar-company/Did-Pixar-accidentally-delete-Toy-Story-2-during-production/answer/Oren-Jacob https://www.quora.com/P

by jefftk 4y ago

More details on Quora: https://www.quora.com/Pixar-company/Did-Pixar-accidentally-delete-Toy-Story-2-during-production/answer/Oren-Jacob https://www.quora.com/Pixar-company/Did-Pixar-accidentally-d... The ending is sad -- that intrepid recovery mostly didn't end up used: And then, some months later, Pixar rewrote the film from almost the ground up, and we made Toy Story 2 again. That rewritten film was the one you saw in theatres and that you can watch now on Blu-Ray.

haswell 4y ago
I don't know about sad necessarily - if the earlier iteration was necessary to realize they needed to make the changes that brought us the final version, it's all part of a larger journey. I can see how this could be frustrating for people involved, but reshoots / rewrites are part of the process. And I suspect that the recovery of character models and other assets was still instrumental in making the final film, if not the actual shots/sequences themselves.
trynewideas 4y ago
Considering how good Toy Story 2 was, "sad" is an odd way of putting it, unless you're talking about the ensuing crunch. There are a few more details about that side of the story elsewhere: https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/lightyear-toy-story-2-deleted-b2017238.html https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/... https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/toy-story-2-disasters-almost-killed-movie/ https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/toy-story-2-disasters-almos...
- nathanvanfleet 4y ago
  The sad part is that the thing they saved didn't actually get used and was just thrown out. So it wasn't exactly the big save it's made up to be. But if it wasn't framed as a big save maybe it wouldn't be posted every week or so.
  - haswell 4y ago
    If the thing they saved hadn’t been saved, it makes me wonder if they would have remade it as written, and then either have to throw that out or release what was by all accounts not a good first pass. I suspect some character models were reused, and recovering what they did enabled the rewrite that came after. I think it’s still fair to characterize this as a big save even if it wasn’t used as-is. They arguable needed the first version to decide to move away from it.
diskzero 4y ago
I think we made How to Train Your Dragon three times at DreamWorks. So many rewrites, director changes, character redesign, etc. If you ever wonder why a feature length animated film can cost over $300 million dollars, this is one reason.
- pkulak 4y ago
  Worth it. Love that movie.
- mmcgaha 4y ago
  It is good to hear that big up front design sucks as much for movies as it does for software.
  - diskzero 4y ago
    It can be real pressure cooker. Developers who come in not from the game development world are often shocked by the brutal hours. The artists have it the worst however. They tend to get laid off in droves as productions ramps down. Directors and writers also get fired. They seem to be less immune to being punished than other management types in more traditional software companies.
    - guzik 4y ago
      > Developers who come in _not_ from the game development I've been working on hardware, firmware, backend, frontend, crypto, hft, mobile apps and games. I think that on average you need to rewrite your game 3 times so it feels 'right'.
- skunkworker 4y ago
  In college I remember hearing from one of my animation professors that DreamWorks switched between NURBS and polygons for How To Train Your Dragon, I'm unsure which direction it was but I don't envy the artists tasked with that if true.
  - 4y ago
AdmiralAsshat 4y ago
This seems to be par for the course for Pixar. I remember many of the deleted scenes from the Inside Out DVD were prefaced with explanation from Pixar that they were from a much earlier draft. They realized after working through the first draft that they now had a much better understanding of the characters, and then rewrote the narrative to match.
- chx 4y ago
  Zootopia was also rewritten. https://lostmediawiki.com/Zootopia_(partially_found_pre-rewrite_version_of_CGI_animated_film;_early_2010s) https://lostmediawiki.com/Zootopia_(partially_found_pre-rewr... > This decision came fairly late in the process, as animators had been working on the film for almost a year with only 17 months until it needed to be completed.
  - hinkley 4y ago
    Nobody comes into a digital movie with all of their tools already written and running at top speed, right? Isn't this typically a process where frames per hour is pretty low at first and ramps up as you go?

by jefftk 4y ago

haswell 4y ago

I don't know about sad necessarily - if the earlier iteration was necessary to realize they needed to make the changes that brought us the final version, it's all part of a larger journey. I can see how this could be frustrating for people involved, but reshoots / rewrites are part of the process. And I suspect that the recovery of character models and other assets was still instrumental in making the final film, if not the actual shots/sequences themselves.

trynewideas 4y ago

Considering how good Toy Story 2 was, "sad" is an odd way of putting it, unless you're talking about the ensuing crunch. There are a few more details about that side of the story elsewhere: https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/lightyear-toy-story-2-deleted-b2017238.html https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/... https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/toy-story-2-disasters-almost-killed-movie/ https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/toy-story-2-disasters-almos...

nathanvanfleet 4y ago
The sad part is that the thing they saved didn't actually get used and was just thrown out. So it wasn't exactly the big save it's made up to be. But if it wasn't framed as a big save maybe it wouldn't be posted every week or so.
- haswell 4y ago
  If the thing they saved hadn’t been saved, it makes me wonder if they would have remade it as written, and then either have to throw that out or release what was by all accounts not a good first pass. I suspect some character models were reused, and recovering what they did enabled the rewrite that came after. I think it’s still fair to characterize this as a big save even if it wasn’t used as-is. They arguable needed the first version to decide to move away from it.

diskzero 4y ago

I think we made How to Train Your Dragon three times at DreamWorks. So many rewrites, director changes, character redesign, etc. If you ever wonder why a feature length animated film can cost over $300 million dollars, this is one reason.

pkulak 4y ago
Worth it. Love that movie.
mmcgaha 4y ago
It is good to hear that big up front design sucks as much for movies as it does for software.
- diskzero 4y ago
  It can be real pressure cooker. Developers who come in not from the game development world are often shocked by the brutal hours. The artists have it the worst however. They tend to get laid off in droves as productions ramps down. Directors and writers also get fired. They seem to be less immune to being punished than other management types in more traditional software companies.
  - guzik 4y ago
    > Developers who come in _not_ from the game development I've been working on hardware, firmware, backend, frontend, crypto, hft, mobile apps and games. I think that on average you need to rewrite your game 3 times so it feels 'right'.
skunkworker 4y ago
In college I remember hearing from one of my animation professors that DreamWorks switched between NURBS and polygons for How To Train Your Dragon, I'm unsure which direction it was but I don't envy the artists tasked with that if true.
- 4y ago

AdmiralAsshat 4y ago

This seems to be par for the course for Pixar. I remember many of the deleted scenes from the Inside Out DVD were prefaced with explanation from Pixar that they were from a much earlier draft. They realized after working through the first draft that they now had a much better understanding of the characters, and then rewrote the narrative to match.

chx 4y ago
Zootopia was also rewritten. https://lostmediawiki.com/Zootopia_(partially_found_pre-rewrite_version_of_CGI_animated_film;_early_2010s) https://lostmediawiki.com/Zootopia_(partially_found_pre-rewr... > This decision came fairly late in the process, as animators had been working on the film for almost a year with only 17 months until it needed to be completed.
- hinkley 4y ago
  Nobody comes into a digital movie with all of their tools already written and running at top speed, right? Isn't this typically a process where frames per hour is pretty low at first and ramps up as you go?