My Monster's University Class Schedule! #MonstersUEvent #MonstersU

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I was not compensated in any way for this post. I solely received a press trip to Pixar to cover the film. All opinions are my own.

Hey All,

During my day at Monster’s University (aka Pixar), I learned so much about the amazing universe of Monsters and how this world came to be. We had a curriculum of “classes” set for the day in which we met with some of the cast, film makers, designers, and animators to discuss how the film was made. Each class had a great theme and was jam packed with information about the film.

Our first class of the day was ENGLISH 101: How to Tell a Great Story! Our Instructor was Kelsey Mann (Story Supervisor). He showed us the process of coming up with the set designs and story designs for the film.

We learned about the story process and how each scene in the film starts with actual sketches of each scene.

He also showed us how to draw a young Mike Wazowski!

I think my young Mike came out pretty well actually. Yes I messed up his arm, but he’s still adorable.

The next class we had was SOCIOLOGY 203: The Deconstruction of a Character!

We learned from our instructors Ricky Nierva (Production Designer), Jason Deamer (Character Art Director) & Daniela Strijleva (Character Designer) about the design of the college-aged Mike & Sulley, and how they created & designed the new characters in the film. They reveled that they made the skin of the monsters more like a babies skin. The also got rid of any wrinkles under Mike’s Eye or on his skin to make him look younger. They made Sulley’s fur thicker and softer looking.

It was so great to see which characters are coming back from Monster’s Inc in this movie and it was also great to see all the amazing new characters they created like Squishy. He’s my new favorite as he’s so adorable.

Our next class was ANTHROPOLOGY 152: Monsterizing the World. We Learned about creating and “monsterizing” the world of MU. They created all kinds of monsters in this film to fill the world of Monster’s University!

Our Instructors were Dice Tsutsumi (Shading/Lighting Art Director) & Robert Kondo (Sets Art Director).

They showed us how they created Monsters that swim, fly, and everything in between. It was great to see how they brought the campus to life.

Next up was DRAMATIC ARTS: Bringing a Character to Life. We learned how the animation process works and how long it can take to make one character work in the film. The animators have to make each hair, arm, and leg work in order to have the character come to life. Thanks to our Instructor: Scott Clark (Supervising Animator) we viewed an animation demo on a linux machine of how Sulley’s hair follicles worked as they are animated. Sulley actually has thousands of hairs that need to be animated so that they look natural as he walks.

Our last class of the day was PHYSICS 250: Global Illumination.

We viewed a presentation on the use of Global Illumination in Monster’s University and in the short film The Blue Umbrella.

The instructors Jean-Claude (JC) Kalache (DP-Lighting), Sanjay Bakshi (Supervising Technical Director) & Christine Waggoner (Simulation Supervisor) spoke about how they based the lighting for this film on the original Monster’s Inc. film.

They also spoke about how the lighting is just as important as animating a character in the film. The lighting has to be perfect in a scene in order for the scene to work. The lighting has to look as close as they can make it to natural lighting.

It was an amazing day filled with so much learning and fun. Seeing all dedication being put into this film to bring it to everyone, only wants to make me see it even more in the theater.

I highly recommend you check out this adorable film when it comes out in theaters June 21st!

For all the latest on Monster’s University visit the official website or http://monstersuniversity.com/edu/ or

Like and Follow Monster’s U on Facebook.com/PixarMonstersUniversity and Twitter.com/DisneyPixar with Hastags #MonstersUEvent and #MonstersU.