In just over a month, we’ll finally get to see the much-awaited sequel to Finding Nemo- Finding Dory! In case you’ve been living under a rock {or in a sea anemone}, here’s what the movie’s about:
About the Movie:
Disney•Pixar’s “Finding Dory” welcomes back to the big screen everyone’s favorite forgetful blue tang Dory (voice of Ellen DeGeneres), who’s living happily in the reef with Marlin (voice of Albert Brooks) and Nemo (voice of Hayden Rolence). When Dory suddenly remembers that she has a family out there who may be looking for her, the trio takes off on a life-changing adventure across the ocean to California’s prestigious Marine Life Institute, a rehabilitation center and aquarium. In an effort to find her mom (voice of Diane Keaton) and dad (voice of Eugene Levy), Dory enlists the help of three of the MLI’s most intriguing residents: Hank (voice of Ed O’Neill), a cantankerous octopus who frequently gives employees the slip; Bailey (voice of Ty Burrell), a beluga whale who is convinced his biological sonar skills are on the fritz; and Destiny (voice of Kaitlin Olson), a nearsighted whale shark. Deftly navigating the complex inner workings of the MLI, Dory and her friends discover the magic within their flaws, friendships and family.
As a movie fan, I’ve often wondered about the process that goes into creating a story for a movie. Last month, I had the opportunity to hear from Story Supervisor Max Brace and Co-Director Angus MacLane about Dory’s Story! They told us all about how a movie- in particular, Finding Dory- goes from concept to final product.
Idea
Co-Director Angus MacLane told us a bit about how this movie came to be. After all this time {Finding Nemo hit theaters 13 years ago}, Director Andrew Stanton had a nagging thought- he was worried about Dory. It took awhile before he actually decided to make the film- he asked several people if they thought it would be a good idea, including MacLane. Once everyone was on board, they started brainstorming!
Brainstorming
When the time comes to make the story, the first step is to brainstorm. Some things come easily- like how Stanton knew he wanted a lot of the movie to take place at the Marine Life Institute {an aquarium and sea life rehabilitation center}. Other things come from discussion- a team gets together and talks about what could happen in the story that would be entertaining. They think about what types of settings they could use and what could happen at each one to either engage the audience or drive the story.
The inspiration for one of the funniest scenes I’ve seen {I screen about 20 minutes of the film} came from Story Supervisor Max Brace. He remembered taking his son to the aquarium and taking him to the touch pool and he thought that could make an exciting- and scary- set piece. He wanted to know what that would be like for Dory, so the team started researching. They went to various aquariums and watched how people- especially kids- interacted with the touch pools. They checked out what kinds of creatures could be found in the pools and how they were all shaped, trying to get ideas for what would work best in the story.
During their research, while at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, they headed to the quarantine section. There, Brace found starfish and asked why they were being isolated. He found out that they were just too stressed out from the touch pool and they were giving them a break!
Writing and Rough Sketches
Once the main brainstorming session is done, the writer- or team of wirters- goes and makes up a script. As soon as a scene is scripted, or at least blocked out, it gets assigned to an artist. The artist will make very basic sketches for the entire scene so that they can get an idea of what it will look like when it’s done. According to MacLane, the goal is, “trying to take the words that are on the page and translate them into the visual storytelling language of the film.”
While we were listening to the presentation, Brace drew out a rough version of the touchpool scene for us. He did it digitally, using a computer and a stylus, and quickly drew several rough sketches. With each sketch, he told us what was happening and narrated the scene- even though the sketches were much more basic than the final animation, the scene came to life before our eyes!
Fine Tuning
After the artist has gone through the whole sequence to get an idea of the acting and blocking of the scene, they sit down with the Director and go through it while the Director gives notes. At our presentation, MacLane gave Brace notes just like he would in a normal meeting! He would make suggestions about making eyes pop out a bit more or making it a little more dramatic. It was really fun being able to see the scene change right in front of us.
When we go see a movie at the theater, we never know how close the finished product is to the original idea. Of course sometimes we’re lucky and a DVD will include a few deleted scenes, but often the movie ends up way different than the original idea. Watching them talk about just one particular scene and seeing all the potential changes that could have been made if this was a real meeting was astounding! The filmmakers really work so, so hard to make these movies perfect. They are so creative!
It’s fun listening to them pitch the scene because even though it’s not truly animated and the real character voices aren’t there, you can easily imagine in your head what it’ll look like. They give life to the characters and get excited about it, and they work together to make the scene the best that it can be.
Giving Characters a Voice
After the meeting with the Director, the artist goes back and takes the notes they got and decides what to change. They get everything ready and bring it to editorial, where they begin to establish the other elements, like scratch voices.
A “scratch voice” is a temporary voice that’s used for a character while the movie is still in development. For a long time, movies are changed quite often. It would get expensive- not to mention time consuming- for the voice actors to come to the studio every time that a scene needed voices, especially since the script could change any minute. Until the scene is perfected, they use temporary voices supplied by people who work at Pixar to stand in for the actors. Using these voices allows the team to time out a scene and see how the pace will be when it’s completed so that they can make adjustments if necessary. It also lets them see how the story sounds out loud so that they can see if it flows.
For example, Director Andrew Stanton provides the scratch voice for Marlin, so they would have him record lines, then play his voice recordings along with temporary music and sound effects. They’d show the storyboards to build the scene and see how things timed out and make adjustments as needed!
Finishing Touches
After a scene is complete- though still roughly animated and using scratch voices- they play it for the “Brain Trust”, which is a large group of people from the studio that act almost like a focus group. They provide notes and give some insight into it from another point of view. For example, in the scene that we were able to see, they realized that Hank {more on him soon} was leading the scene instead of Dory. Since it’s Dory’s movie- and Dory’s journey- that needed to change. The team took the note to heart and rewrote aspects of the scene to emphasize Dory more, which plays well when you see the finished scene!
It takes years sometimes for scenes to go from concept to final product. A whole team works on it to make sure it makes sense and adds to the story. For Finding Dory, over 103,000 storyboards were delivered to editorial over the course of making the film, which took 3 and a half years to make.
Finding Dory hits theaters June 17th! You can keep up with updates about Finding Dory by following the hashtags #FindingDory and #HaveYouSeenHer. Don’t miss these free Finding Dory Coloring Pages & Activity Sheets or my tour of the Monterey Bay Aquarium, where I shared a lot of cute animal photos from one of the places that inspired the setting for the movie!
