Pixar Shares Its Storytelling Secrets Through Digital Khan Academy Course

Pixar has never been shy about sharing the storytelling secrets that have helped its animated movies become some of the most well-regarded films in Hollywood history. Now, the studio is giving its fans a new way to pick up the essential tricks of the animation trade. It has teamed up with Khan Academy to launch a new season of Pixar in a Box, an instructional course that turns Pixar employees into instructors.

Like other Khan Academy courses, Pixar in a Box drills into a specific category and educates its viewers through demonstrations. In this particular case, the subject is computer-generated animation, and the 12 videos assembled so far on the Khan Academy Labs YouTube channel and on the Pixar in a Box website include guides to modeling, set design, and effects.

The new season is all about storytelling, and it gives some of Pixar’s most notable creative minds an opportunity to discuss how they construct narratives in their movies. In the latest episode, Pete Docter

— the direction of Up, Inside Out, and Monsters Inc. — shares some insights from his creative process. “We hope that by sharing how we tell stories, we’ll inspire students all over the world to tell their own stories,” said Docter in a statement.

More episodes of the “Art of Storytelling” edition of Pixar In A Box will arrive over the next few months. An overview of the series, styled as a Pixar office tour, can be found on the main Khan Academy channel, which has more than three million subscribers.