Behind the Animation: How Pixar Designed Inside Out Characters

You know those little voices in your head? The ones that cheer you up or tell you to be careful? Well, the clever folks at Pixar decided to turn them into actual characters for the movie *Inside Out*. And let me tell you, it wasn’t an easy job!

Imagine trying to draw what “Joy” looks like. Is she yellow? Does she sparkle? And what about “Sadness”? Is she a blob, a raindrop, a little blue cloud?

The team at Pixar spent years figuring this out.

It All Started With Doodles

Before there were any fancy computers, the directors started with simple pencil and paper. They’d sit and sketch silly little drawings. The director, Pete Docter, apparently drew Anger as a grumpy red square for the longest time. And that idea stuck! It just felt right.

But here’s a fun secret: at first, they had way more than five emotions. Can you believe they thought about 27 different ones? There were almost characters for Pride, Hope, and even one called ‘Gloom’. But it got way too confusing. It’s like having too many cooks in the kitchen, nothing gets done.

So, they picked the five big feelings we all know best.

Even their names changed! Sadness was almost called ‘Misty’, and Fear was ‘Freddie’. But in the end, they realised the simplest idea was the best. Just call them what they are: Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust, and Anger.

The Magic of Shapes and Glow

Now, this is the really clever bit. Look closely at the characters. Their shapes aren’t random!

• Joy looks like a star or a little sparkler. She’s all energy and light.
• Sadness is shaped like a teardrop. It’s so simple, but it makes perfect sense, doesn’t it?
• Fear is tall and wobbly, like a raw nerve. He’s always on edge!
• Disgust is green and a bit posh, and her hair? It’s shaped like a piece of broccoli! She wouldn’t be happy about that.
• Anger is that red square, a brick of pure frustration.

The Pixar team wanted to remind us that these aren’t real people. They’re made of energy! To do that, they made the characters glow. If you look closely, their bodies are made of thousands of tiny, shimmering lights. It gives them a really special, magical feeling.

The People Who Brought the Feelings to Life

The drawings and shapes were great, but the characters needed personality. And that came from the actors who gave them their voices.

This is my favourite part. The actors didn’t just show up, read their lines, and leave. They helped shape the movie!

For example, Mindy Kaling, who is the voice of Disgust, was in a meeting where she got really emotional talking about the story. She said it made her sad to think about growing up and leaving childhood behind. And that reaction actually helped the writers realise that this was the heart of the whole film! It’s okay to be sad about change.

The director, Pete Docter, was also inspired by his own daughter. He saw her change from a bubbly, joyful little girl to a quieter, more serious pre-teen. He wondered, “What is going on in her head?” And that’s how the idea for Riley’s story was born.

A Long, Long Process

Making this movie wasn’t quick. It took them over five years! A huge team of artists and animators worked together, slowly turning those first simple doodles into the characters we see on screen.

They asked themselves weird questions like, “Should Disgust look disgusted, or should she be disgusting to look at?” They tried thousands of different looks until they found the perfect one for each feeling.

So, next time you watch Inside Out, you can appreciate all the love and hard work that went into it. From a director’s simple drawing of a grumpy red square, to a team spending years making them glow, it was a real labour of love. And now, whenever you feel one of those big emotions, you might just picture them, hard at work in your own head!