Coloring Outside the Pipeline: Stylized Pastel Techniques In Disney and Pixar's Toy Story 5

Abstract

In Toy Story 5, the "Playtime" sequences presented the unique challenge of visualizing the pure imagination of a child and their toys at play. While previous Toy Story films depicted Playtime scenes in line with the aesthetics of the rest of the film, the creative direction for Toy Story 5 pursued something distinct. These sequences leaned into an ephemeral, hand-drawn style inspired by both pastel artwork and the loose, energetic quality of children’s stage plays and drawings. Achieving this vision ventured outside Pixar’s traditional pipeline, with each department working collaboratively across conventional role boundaries to build a non-linear workflow that balanced stylized abstraction and artistic control. This paper presents a variety of strategies developed to realize these sequences, focusing on three interconnected teams: an FX-driven environment process that leveraged pre-lit geometric pastel assets and point cloud brushstroke instancing, NPR character shading combining static and camera-dependent painterly textures, and a bespoke compositing approach designed to mimic the layered construction of a pastel drawing itself.