OK, now in the official Christmas l00ts thread, as well as the Happy Holidays 2010 thread, I mentioned that I got something special that I wouldn't mention until I posted a video blog about it.

Well, now that I did, it's time to talk about it. For Christmas Eve, I was visiting some relatives, and my aunt gave me, my sister, and a couple other people in our family a special invitation. A tour at Pixar Animation Studios.

I'm really exciting for this and I'm looking forward to going there. Me, along with the rest of my family, set the date for January 21. I might provide videos and photos of the tour if I have the chance.

Here's the video blog that talks about it, which also shows the invitation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0rrezUaXSY

Anyway, I just wanted to let you guys know. What are your thoughts about this?

Awesome.

You're very lucky! I wish I could visit Pixar Animation Studios.

I'm excited for you. That's soo cool! Have fun! :D

Isn't that in Oakland? I thnk I drove past it once.

It's actually in Emeryville, which doesn't sound too far from Oakland. Or where I live for that matter.

Have fun, I'm jealous. :lol:

Nice l00ts d00d.

Congratulations. That is truly a wonderful Christmas present. I could only hope to visit such a place...Is there any chance you might write an article about your trip there after you've taken it?

I do plan on doing a video about it if I have the chance to get some footage from the place. However, an article sounds like a good idea as well. It would kind of be a good mixture of both.

With all that, I'm going to be quite busy on my computer when I get finished with my day at Pixar, for both that and college. But nevertheless though I'm really looking forward to all of that.

Have fun, I'm jealous.

That's pretty damn awesome. I hope you have a great time.

Talk about having luck from all of that Holiday cheer, blueluigi. It'd be fun to experience all the fun that goes on in Pixar's Studios. Wishing you the best of luck, blueluigi. :D

Your right, that really IS a super awesome surprise present, I bet you have a blast :)

Well, I just got back from my Pixar trip, and now to tell you all about it.

To say the least, I was glad to have actually went and check the place out. However, as far as the whole tour and visit goes, it didn't exactly live up to my expectations.

When I first went inside the studio lot, I was in awe when I saw the giant Luxo model along with the giant ball in front of him. After we took pictures of us in front of the Luxo and ball models, we went inside the building waiting for our tour guide.

While we were waiting for our tour guide to come, we were taking pictures of ourselves in front of the Pixar model statues, such as Mike and Sully, two characters from Cars (I'm not sure their names since I haven't really seen that movie), and the aliens from Toy Story. There was also some portraits that we took pictures of ourselves in front of the props and portraits from different Pixar movies. They looked really cool and fun to check out.

So, we went on our tour and it was just through the Pixar art gallery. It was a pretty small gallery that mostly consisted of storyboards and early artwork from Toy Story 3 (and some from Toy Story 1 and 2). It was cool to see how some of the character designs came together, one of which was an early Woody model, which is basically a Fred Flintstone toy put together with cowboy clothing and boots (it's hard to explain exactly what it looked like). They also had one that features vintage Barbie and Ken dolls in their original boxes that was used in Toy Story 3. One of them includes the Great Shape Barbie from 1983. The same Barbie doll that was used in Toy Story 3. They even have an old Ken doll with the same ascot used in the movie.

The art gallery not only featured art work from Pixar, but also they have a Chuck Jones gallery (which I found it kind of odd that they have that since Chuck Jones wasn't part of Pixar), and that was also cool to check out. They have a selection artwork that was used in some of these old Warner Bros cartoons, and monitors that played these Chuck Jones classics, such as The Odor-able Kitty and One Froggy Evening.

Also, over at the downstairs area, they have a Pixar screening room, where they test out scenes from their movies. Now, I couldn't check that place out since the Pixar producers were using it, but apparently, they have a movie night every Monday. Because everywhere in the studio, they have fliers that they're showing the first Back to the Future in the Pixar screening room this Monday. Man, if I was a Pixar employee, I would love to check that out.

After the art gallery tour, we had lunch at Pixar's official employee restaurant, which is called "Cafe Luxo". The food they had was pretty good, although it kind of feels like the same type of grill that's at my local college, although Cafe Luxo was somewhat better.

Once we got done with Cafe Luxo, we went to the official Pixar gift shop, which has some of the basic Pixar stuff, such as books and DVDs. But it also had some Pixar studio exclusive merchandise, which is what I went for. I got myself a Pixar Studios mug, Luxo chocolate, a Toy Story 3 badge, and an official Pixar studios T-shirt. After we got done with that, then the whole visit was over.

Overall, it was fun to check out the place to see a little bit of what they have (and note that I said "a little bit"). However, I was slightly disappointed about the fact that the visit was really short, and there wasn't really as much to the tour as I thought it would be. I mean, for god's sake, we were only there for 2 hours, I thought this was going to be an all day thing. Also, I was expecting the tour to also be where we look around Pixar studios to see the offices, and possibly meet some of the animators and see what they're working on, and how they're doing it. Maybe that's asking for a little too much, but for something that's supposed to be an "Exclusive tour", it really didn't feel that way at all. The art gallery was pretty cool to check out and all, but it was only a very short section of the studio. I guess that's partly because me and everybody else with me are guests (or "Strangers from the Outside" as our name tags were labeled). Ah well, it was still fun regardless despite being such a short visit.

As for the video I said I'm going to be working on, yes, I'm going to be doing that. However it's going to be a very short video since there's not much that needs to be said about this tour, and I have only a handful of stills that I took from the inside of the building and very little video footage from there since filming the inside of the studio was not allowed. If it was an all day thing with some of the stuff that I was expecting to experience from Pixar, then it would probably be relatively long.

As for the images that my aunt took, and post the images here as soon as I receive them. But yeah, that's my whole Pixar trip.

It's great to hear you enjoyed the Pixar tour! Too bad it was short and nothing too spectacular, but hey, still better than nothing :D

Maybe they had Chuck Jones' drawings because they were influenced by his art? I dunno.

Again, glad you had fun!

Life is full of disappointments.

Wait until marriage.

No, they didn't have anything from Miyazaki throughout the entire art tour. It was pretty much just their usual Pixar stuff (primarily Toy Story) along with stuff from Chuck Jones.

OK, as promised, here are some of the images of the trip (and yes I do know the lighting is off on some of them since my aunt took most of them).



Standing in front of the giant Luxo model. BTW, on the left is my sister, the right is my uncle, and the middle is yours truly.



Everybody cowering in fear of being trampled by Luxo (also, my aunt is in this picture).



Woody and Buzz... made out of Legos. Plus, there's Cafe Luxo in the background.



Cars



Aliens... Oooooohhhhhhh......



Below the flying pig.



Mike and Sully



Here I am.... as a gumpy, hunchbacked Toy Story 3 action figure.



Sitting in Lotso's chair (plus there's my cousin sitting next to my sister and my cousin in law sitting next to me)



Looking around Sunnyside daycare in awe.



The Incredibles (god I wish that picture turned out better).



In front of the gift shop hugging a Lotso bear. They really do smell like strawberries.



Finding Nemo

The place looks like a lot of fun. I'm glad you enjoyed your trip, and those displays they have look amazing. The studio makes art, and it's nice to see their displays reflecting those ideals.