Pixar Perfect

The son of a car designer and a graduate from the Industrial Design programme at College for Creative Studies,Detroit,Shuster spent most of his childhood amongst drawings,machines,nuts and bolts. So designing came naturally to him,but his passion always lay somewhere else. Following a job at a small start-up called Rocket Science,Shuster bode time for five-and-a-half years before finding an opportunity to work with Pixar. “The Cars project saw me design only the tertiary characters,like Cheech Marin’s character,all the back ground cars,the road pavers and so on. Then Wall E happened.” Shuster initially had refused to take up art directing for Wall E . “ I had debated about taking up that role for a long time,but I thought I should just stick to drawing and designing and so refused it. But I eventually did take it up for Cars 2. I realised that I was being afraid of nothing. The role in fact played to my strengths and it was effortless.”

At the seminar,Shuster revealed a deeper insight into his creative work. Almost everything that he had done for Cars was pen on paper,but the mechanics of the characters were true to the real deal. “There were times I had to go over the same thing over and over again. I would be asked to ‘smooth out the transitions between the cogs on the wheel or fix the hood,things that I grew up with in Detroit. I used my knowledge and that was the most satisfying part of Wall E . We had to always maintain the honesty of the characters.”

Shuster predicts the build-up a good animation base in India. “The tools are being made to build the industry in India and the future looks good. People quite often are overawed by companies like Pixar. Yes,there is a lot to learn and get inspired from,but you don’t really have to go to Pixar,you can create your own here!”