Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1334563
10 cgw j a n • f e b • m a r c h 2 0 2 1 LINE DRAWING Even more unusual than the new souls are the counselors, ubiquitous characters that are kind of a 2D construct but also inhabit 3D space, formed out of a three-dimen- sional line. All named Jerry, these higher- dimensional entities make sure The Great Before runs like clockwork. They are cheery, optimistic, patient, and enthusiastic, serving as camp counselors of sorts to the new souls in the very chaotic environment of The You Seminar. Similarly configured Terry maintains the accurate count for The Great Beyond; when Joe flees, Terry tracks him to the ends of the earth to restore the count.) The counselors describe themselves as "the universe dumbing itself down for hu- mans to be able to comprehend and getting their forms mostly right," says Podesta. Page, however, describes them in more precise terms: "They had to be 3D ob- jects, even though for the most part they appear kind of as 2D shapes – kind of a 2D construct that also inhabits a 3D space." They emit light; they interact with the world around them. The artists grew inspiration for these characters from Swedish sculpture, nature, and even light. Then, the art department be- gan exploring and drawing forms until they had somewhat of a recognizable character that was malleable enough to be almost anything. The form they settled on was simplistic: a line. "Not just any line, though," Podesta points out. "We're talking about a living line." Modelers at Pixar started out by creating 3D wire sculptures, as animators evaluat- ed how the characters could take shape, viewing them from different angles and dimensions with different expressions and in different forms. Then the animators began exploring shapes, expressions, movements, and transitions. As Podesta points out, the animators didn't just animate a model, they animated a design. "The characters captured that sense of a living line, a piece of art in a form that is understandable yet still ethereal," he says. "To achieve the sense of design within the animation, our animators had to pull from their backgrounds as artists to cra a visually stunning performance." An entire style language had to be devised from scratch, and then it had to be consistent – which is more difficult than it might seem. "You might think that a line looks like the easiest thing in the world to animate, but the technology behind creating these counselors is mindboggling. There's a lot of layers," Podesta says. "The counselors are one of the biggest challenges we've ever animated at Pixar." Because the counselors were living lines, their shape could be literally anything. Animation had to hit whatever shape they needed and have enough controls so arms could appear at different points – and blend eyes, a nose, and a mouth in a very simple line, always maintaining a smooth line, Page says. In fact, animators could control every point if they wanted to, and move those points around. Initially, the group looked at a spline- based solution akin to what was used for Hank's tentacles in Finding Dory, but found that too complex for what was needed here, so they used a NURBS curve. So while the control points the animators were choos- ing were a bit offset from the final curve, a baseline was always maintained. "In each of those characters, it's just a curve with about 310 to 330 control points [animators] could use to pose [the charac- ter]. Some of those control points could turn into an arm. We have controls in there that could tag the parts of the line to indicate an arm right now, or a hand, or an eye. And they would have the kind of standard arm control with elbows, or they could treat it just as a simple line," Page explains. "In some instanc- es, they could take each one of those control points and just pose it by hand to make a specific shape. They're just taking a line with a lot of points, but we had systems whereby they could go from the super-complex to Counselor Jerry listens as Terry fixates on the missing soul from his count when Joe escaped.