To infinity and beyond!
At least that’s how the animators of Pixar’s Toy Story see things as they are always pushing the limits of what’s possible for animation.
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You’ll see what we mean when you see the side-by-side shots of the first Toy Story movie compared to the fourth one that was just released.
Prepare to be blown away!
The animation in ‘Toy Story’ has come a longgg way since the first movie was released in 1995.
Back then, the animation of the first Toy Story movie was unlike anything anyone had ever seen.
It was even the first full-length animated movie to be released.
“The Nightmare Before Christmas” is even a huge reason behind why “Toy Story” was possible.
In 1991, Disney began working with director Tim Burton to create The Nightmare Before Christmas and try out stop-motion.
Because the film was such a massive hit, it made Disney more comfortable about working with Pixar.
“Because of “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” “Toy Story” happened,” director John Lasseter has said.
Rushes to watch the film in extreme gratitude
Instead of settling for “just good enough,” the animators at Pixar were constantly pushing themselves.
It was necessary since the characters had to be rebuilt with each new Toy Story movie.
This gave them the chance to raise the bar.
With each new movie, they would add more details to the characters to give them a more realistic appearance.
Take this comparison shot of the dog from the first ‘Toy Story’ to the cat featured in the fourth.
Fluffy, is that you?
The difference between both animals is pretty mind-blowing.
While the dog looks clearly animated, you could literally mistake the animated cat for being an actual cat.
reaches into screen to pet good kitty
Picture quality has improved as well.
What was once kind of blurry — especially in movie trailers — has become crystal clear.
“We’ve created this world,” says production designer Bob Pauley. “We don’t want to mess with it.”
The animators managed to stay true to the characters’ design, while still making improvements.
Take Woody, for example, one of the main characters in the series.
He looks the same throughout the movies, but simply more polished in the fourth.
His design even has a sort-of 3D effect, compared to the first movie.
The human characters have also visually improved.
The movie Coco must have inspired the human characters since they look very similar.
The 3D look of Bonnie helps interact well with the visually stunning backgrounds.
Since Pixar has made 21 feature-length films since 1995, they’ve had lots of practice honing their skills
Notable Pixar movies that also feature incredible animation include Monsters Inc. , The Incredibles , Cars , and Finding Nemo .
This made making “Toy Story 4”, easier since a lot of animation kinks had already been straightened out.
For example, Insider says that animators were able to make Bo Peep look like an actual doll.
This was thanks to them learning how to master lighting surfaces while making Monsters Inc.
To achieve the level of animation that they did for the fourth installment, Pixar had 117 computers running all day long.
According to Insider, this was part of what’s called rendering, which is what helps build the final product of what we see on screen.
Depending on how complicated each frame in the movie was, it could take from 45 minutes to 30 hours to render.
This meant that some characters got a total glow-up from the first movie!
Damn, Mary Bo Peep! Looking good, girl.
She’s definitely had some “work” done.
She even traded in her bonnet for a bow.
This character plays a major role in the new movie, Toy Story 4 .
To give you an idea of just how important the animation is, consider this: one line of code almost wiped out “Toy Story 2.”
In his book, Pixar co-founder, Ed Catmull, wrote that just one line of code almost completely deleted Toy Story 2 .
“First, Woody’s hat disappeared. Then his boots. Then he disappeared entirely,” he said.
“Whole sequences—poof!—were deleted from the drive.”
Ahhh, we’re getting stressed out just reading this.
Thankfully, a technical director saved the day! She had a backup copy of the film at home with her.
If you didn’t know, the movie was just released on June 21.
Toy Story 4 tells the story of Woody and the gang, old and new, helping show a new Toy, Forky, the ropes of being a toy.
He was created by the character, Bonnie, and is made out of — you guessed it — a fork.
As incredible as some of the animation changes have been to our favorite characters are, some people haven’t been too pleased.
When it comes to nostalgia, change is tricky.
It’s mainly Andy’s character that they’re disappointed with.
Gotta say, I kind of agree with them.
WHO THE HECK IS THIS KID?! BRING BACK THE CREEPY-LOOKING ONE.
Thankfully, we can always count on the internet for bringing us hilarious memes that help dull the pain.
Differences or not, we’re still blown away by how far animation has come.
We can barely draw a stick figure …
If the bar for animation is this high, we can’t wait to see what Pixar brings us next!
The animation team even had time to sneak in a few easter eggs for us.
That’s true dedication, y’all.
If you’re a true fan, you might have already spotted some of the easter eggs in the film.
For instance, you’ll spot Dug from Up in the pic above.
There’s even references to other films in the Pixar universe.
Like the appearance of Ernesto De La Cruz, who is a character from Coco .
If you want to see more of the differences and behind-the-scene secrets for yourself, check out this video by Insider.
It’s pretty incredible!
