As the resident animator, I couldn't resist a Pixar book. I went out and bought The Art of Toy Story 3 yesterday, and then devoured it all in one sitting. A light read by literary standards, it is still dense with information. The book mainly focuses on the progression from the first film to the third and the color script. Not to say that it isn't loaded with concept drawings, layouts, and behind the scenes photos. All good stuff.
Some of the explanation for turning Toy Story into a trilogy sounds like justification, which I don't find necessary. I was five when the first Toy Story movie came out. By the time Toy Story 3 was in theaters, I was entering my third year of college and said good bye to my kid years. Heck, I'd even applied for a summer internship at Pixar. For my generation, Toy Story 3 is a very natural ending to the trilogy.
As for the color script, I've never seen one explored so thoroughly in an "Art of" book. A color script is a "storyboard for color", as the light art director Dice Tsutsumi puts it. It is the place for the director to map out the emotional and vision beats of the film. It helps guide lighting and photography departments, among others. I'd seen them before and understood their importance to lighting a film, but never understood how much thought goes into a particular lighting scheme. I was especially struck by the fact that they connected dappled lighting with the character Bonnie to suggest a safe and protected environment. It's so subtle, but it says so much about the thought that goes into a Pixar film.
I would like to have seen more about the development of the individual character's personalities, especially the new ones. There is some talk about the main antagonist, but there isn't much about the other characters' development.
Still, this is a great buy for anyone interested in animation or visual storytelling. Highly recommended.
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