Rat-a-whoo-ey?

Back in 1995, I was a recent college grad with no kids. But when the movie Toy Story came out, a friend and I ran to go see it; we were both intrigued by the animation--which was (and still is, in my opinion) groundbreaking. With my new degree in graphic design, I was completely fascinated with how the animators at Pixar acheived the level of exquisite detail that they did. That, and the story was pretty cool, too.

Fast forward (gulp) 12 years and 2 kids later: today I took the girls to see Ratatouille, the latest Pixar creation. My kids wanted to see it for all the reasons any kid would want to. I, on the other hand, am still drawn to the animation. And yet again, Pixar never ceases to amaze. Truth be told, the story didn't look all that great (it wasn't really that bad, but I've seen better--and worse, for that matter), but the animation--it was incredible. There are times when you could swear you're looking at a photograph; it's just that real looking.

Last year I took my oldest to the Pixar installation at MoMA; again, utterly amazing. To see familiar characters as they started--as simple sketches--and the detail that goes into the development of not only the characters, but the "sets" themselves; it was so cool. The time, effort and energy that goes into creating these movies is evident in the quality of the animation itself, but to see how everything starts out is almost overwhelming.

After walking out of the museum, my daughter turned to me and said, "I want to work for Pixar."

Not a bad career choice, kid. Not bad at all.