STORY XPERIENTAL WITH PIXAR
Friends From Far Away
Four friends build a treehouse and grow up together. As they navigate adulthood, these friends try to see if their roots remain the same as their childhood.
CREDITS
Concept Sketches
During the first few weeks of the course, we developed several other potential stories. Within our original 'what-if' scenarios, one of the three finalist ideas was "What if everyday life was full of booby traps?".
Initially, we chose "What if a group of friends can only meet once a year?". We started developing the characters, Aspen and Skylar, and their story about yearly trips to a cabin.
The story reel would focus on Aspen struggling to let go of the distancing relationship as they grew up.
We all were attached to the idea of showing friendship changing as people grew up, yet we decided to scrap this story about a third of the way through the course. Instead, we wanted to tell our story of four long-distance friends reconnecting and growing up.
In hindsight, I do not recommend entirely changing the story with less than two-thirds left until the final submission deadline. However, we all were really happy with what we were able to create together.
In PIXAR fashion, I hid two easter eggs within our final film. When Anatayla is a child, you see them wearing the same "How You Bean?" shirt as Baby Aspen. Later on, as Anatayla is walking into the Bag Claim, the two characters standing on the right side are Aspen and Skylar.
If you are interested in taking this course, I recommend it! You can participate whether you are from middle school to high school or even as an Adult team. I'm glad that I worked with my friends, yet if you can participate solo too. Check out the website here!
(I am not sponsored by Story Xperiental.)