Contact CU Independent News Staff Writer Kalley Velarde at kalley.velarde@colorado.edu.
What if the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs had missed? That is the question the new Disney-Pixar movie “The Good Dinosaur” aims to answer. Michael O’Brien, the effects technical lead for the film, gave the CUI an inside look into the movie and the effects O’Brien’s team created.
O’Brien says he and his team were in charge of anything that didn’t involve a character moving, meaning they created clouds, smoke, fire, water, rain and lightning, all vital parts of the film. The effects team consisted of about 35 people on the set, whereas on a typical movie there are only 12 to 15 people.
THE GOOD DINOSAUR (Pictured) The T-Rexes. ©2015 Disney•Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
During the production of “The Good Dinosaur,” O’Brien and his team would look at rough story reels and would need to make long-term decisions about the technology they would need to make the pictures come to life.
“’The Good Dinosaur’ in particular has a very epic feel for the environment, for the world that these characters are in,” O’Brien said. “And we’re a big part of that and we knew that we were going to try and do more effects than we’ve ever done on a film.”
There are some scenes that stand out as particularly meaningful to O’Brien. The major river scenes where Arlo, the main character, is thrown around, as well as the scene where Arlo and Poppa, Arlo’s father, move their tails across the grass, causing the fireflies to glow, are all important to O’Brien and his team.
THE GOOD DINOSAUR – SEEING THE LIGHT — An Apatosaurus named Arlo makes an unlikely human friend in Disney•Pixar’s “The Good Dinosaur.” Directed by Peter Sohn, “The Good Dinosaur” opens in theaters nationwide Nov. 25, 2015. ©2015 Disney•Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
“We care very dearly about those moments in particular,” O’Brien said. “There’s a lot of energy put into almost every picture you see, and those in particular are very beautiful.”
Beyond these intricate scenes, “The Good Dinosaur” stands out as the first Disney-Pixar movie to have 3D clouds used throughout the entire film.
“The set is based on USGS [United States Geological Survey] data that goes on forever, basically as far as you can see, and in order for that to work right we had to put clouds into that space,” O’Brien said. “They’re laid in and intentionally dressed in 3D. They react to light just like a cloud would and it gave us things like cloud shadows.”
O’Brien felt he and his team played a much bigger part in creating the story than they have with past films, which was important to him. And their goals weren’t purely about the technical merits.
“I want people to go and enjoy the movie. I don’t want them to go, ‘Oh, those are the best clouds I’ve seen,’ ‘That river is fantastic,’” O’Brien said. “We’re just doing this so that people believe the world that they’re in, but we did spend a lot of time and energy trying to make it as big and epic as we could.”
THE GOOD DINOSAUR – Pictured (L-R): Arlo, Spot. ©2015 Disney•Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
In terms of what the public has already seen, the trailers of the film reveal vital messages to the audience, such as getting through your fears and how two creatures from completely different worlds can become friends.
In the first official trailer of “The Good Dinosaur,” the creators decided to show Poppa’s death scene in order to grab viewers’ attention. Poppa dies while trying to save Arlo.
Although the creators decided to reveal this death before the movie’s release, O’Brien describes it as just one important piece of a larger story that allows Arlo to overcome his fears and the situation he is put in. Along those lines, O’Brien also said that while working on the film, one of the messages he got out of the story is that a person needs to experience something in order to know who they are and to understand what they’re capable of.
There are other important relationships in the story besides that of Arlo and his father. Humans are considered the companions of dinosaurs in the movie, which is shown through Arlo and Spot’s relationship. Spot is the human Arlo befriends on his journey back home and Spot has also experienced the loss of a loved one. Relationships like this are what create an aspect that people will be able to relate to.
THE GOOD DINOSAUR – Pictured (L-R): Arlo, Forrest Woodbush (aka: The Pet Collector). ©2015 Disney•Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
“The emotion and compassion that you have for the characters, the empathy,” O’Brien said. “It’s hard not to get sucked in instantly and be along for the whole ride.”
Given his satisfaction with his work, O’Brien pushes young up-and-coming artists, animators and filmmakers to reach for their dreams, as the animation industry is globalizing. According to O’Brien, jobs are available all over the place if you’re willing to travel and if you have talent.
O’Brien originally went to school for mathematics and computer engineering, but has always wanted to work for Pixar.
“If you asked me what my dream job was as a teenager, it was to make movies on a computer,” O’Brien said. “I didn’t know that was a possibility at the time.”
O’Brien has also worked on many renowned Pixar films, such as “Monsters Inc.,” “Finding Nemo,” “The Incredibles,” “WALL-E,” “Up” and the Academy Award-winning film “Brave.” O’Brien has also been working on the film “Finding Dory,” which premieres in Summer 2016. “The Good Dinosaur” is another addition to this list.
“I think that it’s very different from what we have typically done in the past,” O’Brien said of “The Good Dinosaur.” “And I hope people go see it because it’s definitely different and exciting.”
“The Good Dinosaur” hits theaters on Nov. 25.
