COOL STUFF
Apple's Designer Actually Helped Design Wall-E's Eve Robot
by Alex Billington
May 18, 2008
Source: Fortune
I love Wall-E! I'm telling the truth when I say I watch the trailer almost every single night. I wanted to make mention of a great article today about the design of the Eve robot in Wall-E. We've all seen and fallen in love with the cute little yellow robot named Wall-E, but we can't forget to mention Eve - Wall-E's love interest. In the film, Eve is sent from the mothership to investigate Earth and the innocent and romantic Wall-E falls in love with her. In an article in Fortune, Wall-E's director Andrew Stanton explains that Apple's lead designer, Jonathan Ive, who is credited as the designer of the iMac, iPod, and iPhone, was referred to Pixar for a day via the request of Steve Jobs.
"I wanted Eve to be high-end technology - no expense spared - and I wanted it to be seamless and for the technology to be sort of hidden and subcutaneous," Andrew Stanton, Wall-E's director, told Fortune. "The more I started describing it, the more I realized I was pretty much describing the Apple playbook for design."
Back in 2005 when Stanton was working on the basic elements of the film, he called up Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who sent Jonathan Ive over to Pixar to consult with Stanton on the prototype. While he did provide a few tips and ideas, Stanton said that Ive, who is notoriously known for not saying much, didn't really make too many modifications. "The most he could do is nod his head to the things we said we wanted to do." Ive wouldn't comment on the situation, but it's definitely exciting to hear that Apple's design guru had a hand in designing one element of Wall-E, even if he didn't change too much.
If you're curious about the design of Wall-E himself, too, Stanton mentioned back at WonderCon in February that the original idea came to him while he was playing with binoculars at a baseball game. "You don't need a mouth, you don't need a nose, you get a whole personality just from [the binoculars]." As for Wall-E, Stanton said that he "wanted to see it as a machine first and as a character second." I'm very curious to hear the complete stories behind the development of all of the major characters and will definitely be sure to follow up with Stanton about this as we near the release of Wall-E in June.
Apple fans and other Wall-E supporters should check out the full article in Fortune, although there isn't much beyond what we've already mentioned. I'm personally looking forward to Wall-E more than any other movie this summer and I'm mesmerized by every last article I read on the design and development, especially anything from Andrew Stanton. Wall-E hits theaters everywhere on June 27th. Stay tuned for plenty more great coverage of Wall-E as we head deep into the summer movie season!
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15 Comments
1
So there truly is an I robot
Iron Man Fan on May 18, 2008
2
http://www.slashfilm.com/2008/05/14/must-watch-animatronic-wall-e-spotted-in-la/?=rssfeed
Keith on May 18, 2008
3
no wonder Eve looks like an egg... thanks for the link, Keith. that's a pretty cool animatronic. you KNOW we'll be seeing him around all the disney parks.
craziemutant on May 18, 2008
4
already heard of this at ign a few months back. but still cool to know.
Tristan on May 18, 2008
5
Alex did you post this just to rub in mah face? damn Mac users lol
CSpuppydog on May 18, 2008
6
Yeah he just "nodded", he was probably thinking "Wow they totally just ripped off the icon for automator. cheeky bastads..."
SmartGuy on May 18, 2008
9
Thats hilarious. Everytime I'd see the trailer with Eve It always reminded me of Apple products.
john on May 18, 2008
10
ummm.... something tells me that one night Stanton was watching 'Short Circuit' on TV and remembered how cool Johnny 5 was. ...then was at a baseball game the next day and thought, "That's it! I can just say these binoculars were what inspired me! THEN IT'LL LOOK ORIGINAL!!" there, I said what everyone is really thinking.
Daniel on May 18, 2008
11
looks so much like a Lego toy to me
louis on May 19, 2008
12
You need designers to come up with that?
avoidz on May 20, 2008
13
this kind of turned me off like most mac users do i guess its cool as long as justin long doesnt show up doing that stupid commercial and yes this totally bites Johnny 5 but fuck it i cant wait to see this regardless its good humour and a nice break
Jont on May 28, 2008
14
There were some very cool concepts in Wall E. It's nice to see an original film regarding AI. The whole terminator routine is really getting old fast. For those that are AI/Robot enthusiasts like myself, check out Jeeney AI. She's still in early development but is learning much faster than anything similar I've seen before.
Sarah on Dec 18, 2008
15
Bullcrap. I went to a speaking with the guy who designed EVE and Wall-E AND the characters from cars. His name is Jay Shushter. JAY SHUSTER! Not the guy from apple. Get your freaking facts straight!
Pixar Boy on Dec 29, 2008
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