Disney's cute Porsche - Sally Carrera
from Automotive (1559 articles)
Disney's cute Porsche - Sally Carrera
Image Gallery ( 3 images )March 27, 2006 Looks kinda cute for a Porsche doesn’t it. The characters of hotshot rookie racecar Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson), Sally Carrera, a snazzy 2002 Porsche 911 (voiced by Bonnie Hunt) and Mater, a rusty but trusty tow truck (voiced by Larry The Cable Guy) from Disney•Pixar’s upcoming release, “CARS” exist not only on the movie screen, but in sheetmetal as well. Our old mate West Coast movie car creator (“if it doesn’t work it’s just not finished yet”) Eddie Paul, with help from Porsche and Pixar Animation Studios’ artists and technicians, created life-sized versions of three of the film’s lead characters. Sally Carrera, a converted Porsche 911, was the first of the film’s stars to roll off the production line. Paul, who was introduced to Porsche by entertainer Jay Leno, has been building cars for Hollywood for more than three decades.
In the foreword to Paul’s upcoming book, Studio Services president Howard D Buck tells the story of the introduction. Studio Services represents Porsche for product placement in the motion picture and television industries. “In 2002, we were approached by Pixar about obtaining the rights to use a 911 Porsche sports car in an animated feature they were developing. “
“From that initial request, some great friendships and a wonderful working relationship was cultivated between the three companies, and led to Porsche’s desire to be involved not only in the film but also in the promotion and marketing of CARS as well.
“Early in the planning stages, we decided that we couldn’t accomplish much in the way of promotions without an actual car to use at the various marketing events. The quandary lay in finding someone who could build an exact full-scale duplicate of our character, “Sally Carrera”, and her costars, “Lightning McQueen” and “Mater”. We contemplated starting with a regular production 911 Porsche sports car, and having the prop guys develop the mouth and eyes. But who could do the extensive modifications needed to meet the exacting demands of the Pixar animators and model builders, while still maintaining the drivability of the vehicle? For that matter, who could cut our 911 in half without butchering the body, frame and vehicle controls? We thought through all of the car companies we had worked with here in Hollywood over 30 years of serving the industry and literally came up blank.
“That led me to the ultimate car guy of all car guys, Jay Leno. I approached him in his garage one evening with pictures of the two cars we wanted to build. Without hesitation, he said, “You need to talk to Eddie Paul.” When I asked Jay who Eddie Paul was, he informed me that Eddie was the only person who could possible build these vehicles. Next thing I knew, Jay handed me his cordless phone with Eddie on the line. We faxed over the pictures and without hesitation (I liked that), Eddie said, “No problem, we can build the cars for you.” He quoted a ballpark price that was close to our budget and the next day I was touring his facilities in El Segundo California.
“On the way to his shop I thought “Sure, Eddie has built custom cars and bikes along with a plethora of other devices.” But could he possibly take a 3D computer animated creation, utilizing computer generated digital dimensions of the characters, and duplicate it as a fully functioning automobile? Could this actually be accomplished? The daunting project required extensively modifying a Porsche 911 Coupe, as well as building bodies from plastic for the other two characters, all while using built-from-scratch frames and drive trains.… Impossible!!!
“The even bigger question racing through my mind was what a Hollywood film industry car maker was doing in El Segundo anyway!
“It didn’t take more than ten minutes of listening to Eddie detail and display some of his past accomplishments before I knew that this was, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the right guy for the project.
“Next came the difficult part – convincing Pixar that it could be done and that Eddie Paul was the man to do it! After a few conference calls, Pixar sent their representative, Jay Ward, down to see the facilities and to meet Eddie. On the ride back to the airport, Jay whole-heartedly agreed that if anyone could do this job correctly, it was Eddie.
