Creating an Underwater World

     Finding Nemo is easily in the top five of Disney Pixar movies. The team that created the movie spent a lot of time creating the underwater world of Finding Nemo. Executive producer, John Lasseter, believes that  "No matter what the subject matter is, you can not to enough research". John also says that early in the production of the movie he told members of the crew that they must get certified and must scuba dive to get a real sense of how the ocean floor should look.
   

     The next task set was for the animators to take the shots they got and try to recreate them through animation. There was one problem. . . they did too good of a job. They said they want the the viewer to feel like this world could exist, but that it should still be clearly a make believe world. The team still used there diving experience in every scene in Finding Nemo to make sure that type of water fit the setting that was in the movie. The things that they had to take into account are the way the water moves and it's effect on undersea plant life, particles that float around the water, where the murkiness of the water should start to have an effect on color, the way the sun lights the ocean floor, and the way that beams of light can be seen while under the water. This wasn't a once and done task however. The team had to recreate the and alter these effects for each different setting of water in the film.

The water has a very different look in the reef, than it does in the deep ocean water, and that has a different look than the water in the Sydney Harbor.