谈皮克斯早期岁月
Steve gazes into the camera as he cradles his chin in his right hand, his left hand resting on top of a newspaper on the table. 史蒂夫凝视着镜头，右手托着下巴，左手放在桌上的一份报纸上。
Steve, in a white shirt, writes on a whiteboard. He has a look of concentration and is sticking out his tongue. 史蒂夫穿着白衬衫在白板上书写，神情专注，舌头微微吐出。
A memo from Steve on the NeXT letterhead proposes meeting-free Thursdays and warns against managerial bureaucracy. 一张史蒂夫写在 NeXT 信纸上的备忘录，提议周四不开会，并警告不要出现管理官僚化。
Steve sits in a chair, hand cradling his head, and stares at a life-size pink foam NeXT computer prototype. 史蒂夫坐在椅子上，手托着头，凝视着一个真人大小的粉色泡沫 NeXT 电脑原型机。
Steve kicks a beach ball in a grassy park. He's dressed in ripped jeans and a patterned shirt with rolled-up sleeves. 史蒂夫在绿草如茵的公园里踢着沙滩球。他穿着破洞牛仔裤和卷袖的花衬衫。
背景: 2003年，迪士尼和皮克斯就工作室的未来进行深入谈判时，史蒂夫向电影制作人莱斯利·伊沃克斯讲述了皮克斯的起步。
核心概念
- 皮克斯 (Pixar) - 早期岁月
- 约翰·拉塞特 (John Lasseter) - 制作短片走向《玩具总动员》
- 莱斯利·伊沃克斯 (Leslie Iwerks) - 电影制作人
- 玩具总动员 (Toy Story) - 走向的目标
内容
中文翻译
皮克斯早期的策略是：找到付账单的方法。在背景中，我们在开发动画软件，约翰[拉塞特]在制作走向《玩具总动员》的一系列短片。但我们在努力付账单，只是争取时间。那个策略结果证明行不通。可能如果你从后视镜看，我们最好直接资助动画工作，而不是试图通过这些其他产品来付账单，比如皮克斯图像电脑和软件，但那是我们尽力维持公司的尝试。最后，我最终以写支票来维持公司——那基本上持续了十年。
你可以看到[皮克斯动画短片]从一开始就有魔法。皮克斯的其他技术，你必须是专家才能理解。[……但]你不需要懂任何技术就能欣赏这部电影。这是极其清新的，真正指明了我们想去的方向。我们不想必须说服人们我们的技术很棒——我们知道它很棒。我们想用我们的技术制造一些不需要懂任何技术就能喜爱的东西。而这就是我们最终做到的。
英文原文
On Pixar's Early Days, Make Something Wonderful
On Pixar's Early Days
In 2003, with Disney and Pixar deep in negotiations over the future of the studio, Steve told filmmaker Leslie Iwerks about Pixar's start.
Our strategy in the early days of Pixar was: find a way to pay the bills. In the background, we were developing animation software, and John [Lasseter] was making the succession of short films on the way to Toy Story. But we were trying to pay the bills and just buy time. That strategy really turned out not to work. Probably if you look back in the rearview mirror, we would have been better off just funding the animation efforts and not trying to pay the bills through these other products, such as the Pixar Image Computer and software, but that was our best attempt to try to keep the company going. In the end, I just ended up writing checks to keep the company going—and that basically went on for ten years.
You could see there was magic in [a Pixar animated short film], right from the beginning. With the rest of Pixar's technology, you had to be an expert to understand it. [… But] you didn't have to know anything about the technology to enjoy the film. It was incredibly refreshing and really pointed the way to where we wanted to go. We didn't want to have to convince people that our technology was great—we knew it was great. We wanted to use our technology to make something where nobody needed to know anything about the technology to love it. And that's what we ended up doing.
思考与洞察
- 错误策略的反思: 回头看才知道直接资助动画比卖硬件更明智
- 十年的投资: 乔布斯持续投资十年，显示对讲故事的热情
- 魔法不需要解释: 最好的技术是让技术本身隐形
- 从错误中学习: 皮克斯从硬件销售转向专注动画
- 目标明确: 用技术创造不需要懂技术就能喜爱的东西