Is it your daughter whos painted that?
Thats a lovely piece of work.
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Isnt that cool?
So, youve got three generations of Keanes in the same film, effectively.
Yeah, its amazing.
Somewhere in the painting shes hidden Matisse, the name of our granddaughter.
She hid it in some leaves in the painting in the movie.
You know, no.
I was like, Oh, thats kind of cool.
These things are bigger than any of us when you look at the landscape of timing of big films.
And he said that the sweatbox had to fuse all that together.
He described it as brutal.
Were you working with similar practices here, and how has your perspective on the process changed since then?
Well, on this film, there was an extreme honesty that was happening in our dailies room.
Thats where this film just rose to such an extraordinary level, in that room.
You could call it like the sweatbox, but I wouldnt call it that.
It was more like a therapy session.
The directors would act out moments from scenes, and the animators would be there.
I would be there.
The directors would sit behind me, and Im at a Cintiq, where I could draw.
The animators were around me.
And sometimes I would do a drawing of what they were doing.
And sometimes they would talk very personally about their own lives, opening up their heart.
At times there would be tears.
I was amazed at their honesty.
They were not just doing a job as animator directors.
Constantly, I was encouraging the animators to take this as a moment in their life.
This is your time as an artist.
Take something personal in your life and put it into the screen.
And the animators, everybody could speak openly about each others work, and critique it.
It was sometimes a dog pile mentality.
Nobody wanted to be the weak link.
Everybody wanted that thing to succeed.
Everybody always wanted you to be encouraged to keep going.
So, it was brutal, I wouldnt say.
I wouldnt say it was brutal.
Id say it was very honest, and thats where our film got so much better.
They ended up animating it on paper, and then scanning it.
They did try in the beginning to do the whole thing on computer.
That was the original approach.
Then the rough animation would be cleaned up by CG.
Theyre designed to shortcut.
Do you think, now, that theyre becoming too much of a mental obstacle, though?
I see it as a viable tool.
That guy, he doesnt draw.
He would not be an animator if it was not for the computer.
Before this, before he was an animator on a computer, he was a plumber!
Thats better paid, isnt it?
[Laughs] Yeah!
I hope hes better paid now, though!
So, I dont see the computer as being in the way at all.
I see it as an opportunity for new artists today to express themselves, just like I can.
But there are limitations.
There are things that I cannot do with this pencil here.
If I do 24 drawings a second and I put shading on there, it just kind of boils.
But with the computer, it’s possible for you to control that.
We could do so much more.
Theres another whole approach to animation if you respect the line using the computer.
And that doesnt mean that you shouldnt continue down the path ofTangled.
Im just seeing two different lines, I think.
If we could show you the outtakes!
We had moment s- If the hair doesnt work, the film doesnt work.
And we had moments where we thought that this is never going to work.
How in the world ?
And I would look at them and say, Are they scared?
No, they didnt seem scared.
How are we going to control this?
140,000 hairs, and each one is like a cat with its own mind, going its own way?
Yeah, its 40 pounds.
Thats what we figured.
It was really important to create just the right weight.
We broke that 140,000 down into 47 tubes, to control that.
But it was always with principals of animation.
You cant just say hand-drawn looks better, make it like hand-drawn.
Its like, specifically, exactly,whatare you talking about?
And thats what I was getting from people.
The CG folks, the software people, they were saying, I dont understand, whats different.
What do you want?
What are you looking for?
Okay, these are the principals.
Weve got to have, in the hair, weve got to have rhythm, number one.
I did a drawing of what I saw as rhythm, and suddenly they got it.
Its got to have twist, so that the front side turns to the back side.
And you see the little light bulbs going.
As soon as you gave them specific problems, they were solving them.
Asymmetry is the key to beauty, and the computer does everything symmetrical.
Its dead and lifeless.
We have to find ways to put asymmetry in that, and suddenly, everything was becoming really clear.
Oh, yeah, oh yeah.
I believe that there is.
I believe that our future has to include great, classic fairytales.The Snow Queenis a wonderful story.
Its root goes way, way deep, Frighteningly deep.
The stories that Walt solved were the more solvable ones.
The more difficult ones.
Beauty And The Beast?
Beauty And The BeastandRapunzel.
He said, Yeah, we did.
But we couldnt figure it.
We just set it aside.
And maybe the time for those stories is a new generation, with new messages to tell.
The assumption on something likeRapunzelis that its a technological problem that its not been made before.
No, we could have done it hand-drawn, too.
I really do believe that these films have these moments in history.
Well, theres the management in my own ego that my wife seems to manage really well.
The fact is do I love her?
Am I willing to give up whats important to me so that care for her?
Every day, I take a walk, about an hour walk.
And I give a shot to remember as much as I can that what Im given was given.
I didnt plan on being born in a family with a dad whos an artist.
I was given that.
I didnt plan on becoming an animator.
My portfolio was sent by accident.
I was given that.
I was given that.
All these characters, I was given so much.
And that is the drop at the beginning of this movie.
Its that source, and Im not the source of that.
I keep remembering that.
I take a walk each day, and think about those things.
That keeps it in perspective for me, because Im like anybody else.
Tangled arrives in UK cinemas on Friday 28th January.