Hank's California Adventure (including a trip to Pixar)--Big Pictures

I just got back from my first trip ever to California. I mainly stayed around the San Francisco area. My main objective while there was to visit with Bob Peterson, who is an alum of my college. He's a writer and director for Pixar, but you probably know him best as the voices of Mr. Ray and Roz. He's also writing and co-directing Pixar's next film, Up, due in theaters May 29.

Here are some pictures from my first day in California:

I rode the obligatory cable cars through the streets of San Francisco. It was an...exhilarating...experience...to say the least.

Nob Hill, from the aforementioned cable car.

The cable car spat me out right at Fisherman's Wharf, so I decided to walk around a bit.

I had dinner at an In-N-Out Burger, which I hear is a California institution. The burger was really good, though I wasn't a huge fan of the fries.

One of the interesting things about In-N-Out is that they reference Bible verses in out of the way places on their packaging. Interesting.

More to come.

 

[Captain Hank]

An In-N-Out Burger wrapper.

The original Ghiradelli Chocolate Factory. I remember seeing it on a mural in the DTD location.

Alcatraz Island from Fisherman's Wharf.

The Golden Gate Bridge from Fisherman's Wharf.

The San Francisco skyline.

Still more to come.

 

[Captain Hank]

On my second day in San Francisco, I traveled to nearby Emeryville to visit Pixar Animation Studios.

The Studio gate.

Gate close-up.

Heading towards the studio.

A giant sculpture of Luxo Jr. and his ball outside the main entrance.

Another view of the Luxo Jr. sculpture.

Lots more to come.

 

[Captain Hank]

The studio main entrance...I'm going in.

The view of the main atrium just on the other side of the door.

The view to the left.

And, the view to the right.

Mike and Sulley greeting visitors...

along with Guido and Luigi.

Lots more coming.

 

[Captain Hank]

The reception desk, complete with toys from various Pixar films.

Posters from WALL E

And, more posters from WALL E

Sulley checking out the action from the second floor (and while wearing jack o'lantern Mickey Ears.

After lunch at Cafe Luxo, Bob took me on a tour of the studio. Most of it was decked out in WALL E artwork.

A WALL E corner on the upper floor.

The WALL E color script.

A close-up of the WALL E color script.

There's still lots more coming, but I think I'm going to have to call it a night. The Panera's where I'm posting from is closing up. More tomorrow.

 

[HollyBelle]

Captain Hank... first off those pictures of San Francisco are wonderful. They really capture the city.

And as for Pixar Studios... it looks exactly as one would expect it to look! I'm loving the Luxo Jr. sculpture. What an exciting adventure and tour. Looking forward to more!

 

[Kristilovesdw]

Wow I'm loving the Pixar Studios pictures! I would love to go there and see all that in person *so jealous*! Thanks so much for sharing, can't wait for more!

 

[rbrower]

Great report so far! I love the pictures!
I can't wait for the rest!

 

[One Lil Spark]

Pixar is AWESOME!! What amazing photos. Thank you so much for posting.

 

[blackthidot]

Nice Photos!

 

[TakeMeThere81]

Great trip report!! San Fran is on our list of possible places we may be moving to in 2009 and its so great to see some pics!! And thanks for giving us all a perspective of the Pixar Studios that we'll all probably never get! I love all the movie garb all over the place, what a fun place to work!

 

[CAPTAIN HOOK]

Great photos - thanks for sharing. Can't wait for the rest (but suppose I'll have to )

 

[sleepybear]

Awesome photos! And after seeing their offices, I can safely say I'd love to work at Pixar.

 

[EPCOT Explorer]

VERY nice!:sohappy:

 

[Captain Hank]

Okay, I made a stop off at a gas station/rest stop that so graciously offers free wi-fi, so I'll post some more while I wait for my food.

One of my favorite things about WALL E was all of the gags associated with the Buy 'n Large Corporation. Here are some of them.

As cutting-edge as Pixar is, they still find it very beneficial to use lots of traditional animation techniques, such as making maquettes, or models of the characters. Here are some models of the humans in WALL E.

And, here are some expression models of the captain of the Axiom.

Here is some concept art of WALL E's flight through space.

This is a huge diagram of some of the "supporting" cast of bots from WALL E

And, here's the little guy himself. This model was actually "printed" by a special plastic printer, using the exact computer model of the character.

 

[Captain Hank]

Some of the photos taken during the research for WALL E. Some production crews get to go to France or South America to do research. The WALL E team got to go to a junkyard.

Concept art of trash.

This was cool--a model of trash, specifically one of the trash towers that was stacked by WALL E.

Continuing around the studio, here's a shot from the other end of the atrium.

On the other side of the atrium, there were lots of panels of concept art for Finding Nemo.

Some expression concepts for Peach, the starfish.

One of the concepts for the Tank Gang's escape.

A storyboard showing the approach of the whale late in the movie.

 

[Captain Hank]

Continuing around, here's a corner devoted to the Incredibles. The movie's color script is on the wall to the right.

Then, we headed downstairs, where I got a few last shots of the inside of the studio, including:

The game room.

The mail room.

And, the cereal bar.

On the way out, I got this shot of the studio's amphitheater:

 

[Captain Hank]

That pretty much does it for the Pixar pictures (though I might add a few more in the future.

After visiting Pixar, I caught a ride to the nearby campus of UC Berkley.

The center of campus, with the bell tower in the background.

I was surprised to find a stand of redwoods right on campus.

More redwoods.

And, another redwood (I'm a botany nut, what can I say? )

The campus also had a stand of very large Eucalyptus trees, apparently the largest in the world. For the purpose of perspective, check out the person in the lower-right corner. Oh, and the whole place smelled vaguely of cough drops.

And, a final shot of Berkley's campus.

I caught the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) back to Oakland, where I was staying. This was kind of interesting--they'd converted a part of the station into a bike holding/parking/repair area.

Well, that pretty much does it for pictures. I'll have a much better narrative of my trip to Pixar up as soon as I can, probably some time tonight.

 

[yankspy]

Great report. Love the Pixar pics.

 

[Captain Hank]

Oh, here are two more random pics:

100 Years of Magic: On Ice? Really? Wasn't 100YOM four or five celebrations ago? Is anything Disney-related turning 100 this year?

Here was a little bit of culture shock--an iPod vending machine. It mostly sells iPod accessories, but there was at least one row of iPod touch units and a row of the new iPod Nanos. This was in the terminal of Oakland International Airport.