Introduction to pitching and feedback

a good story it had all the things I love in a book great characters an interesting world the compelling plot but I'm sure it didn't start out this great sometimes a Pixar story will start one way and by the time it reaches the final version you see on screen it's become something really different did you know in early versions of Toy Story woody was a ventriloquist dummy and not the nicest toy in the box or that Sully was an aspiring dentist in the first version of macho's University in early versions of Coco our main character wasn't called Miguel he was Sam and he didn't even play guitar the fun wasn't even about music good stories don't just pop out of our heads fully formed great stories take many tries and often a few false starts every single Pixar story is the result of imagining and reimagining drawing and redrawing but how do you know if your story's working at Pixar we start by pitching or telling our story early and often in the filmmaking process we tell the story to ourselves in the mirror or as we drive to work we pitch to that girl from the gym whose name were pretty sure is Nadine we pitch to other artists pitching is a little like stand-up comedy but with pictures and likes the end of comedy we can gauge how our stories are doing by the reaction of the audience do they look confused do they understand what's going on in our story we ask for feedback not everyone will get what you're going for I don't really get it some people will really like what you've done you know I really love the Cowboys and you may hear two completely different opinions about your story have you thought of just having one cowboy by doing this process of pitching and refining our stories we make them better could a drawing be clearer more entertaining the security of the shots need to change we ask these questions and edit our stories at Pixar we always say if we don't draw movies we redraw movies sharing and rethinking our stories is a part of the process as you start making stories of your own don't be afraid to ask what if what if there was a dog in this and keep pushing for the best story you can make you