First Rendered Image from Pixar’s ‘Lava’

The first rendered image from Pixar’s new short Lava was published today in the LA Times. Directed by James Ford Murphy, Lava will premiere next week at the Hiroshima International Animation Festival in Japan. It’s a seven-minute musical love story between two mountains: Uku [pictured above] and Lele. In the U.S., it will be released in front of Inside Out on June 19th, 2015.

Murphy told the LA Times that he got the idea for the film twenty years ago while honeymooning in Hawaii:

I thought it would be so cool to fall in love with a place who’s also a character. I wanted to make Uku appealing and likable but also look like he’s been carved out of lava flows.

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This whole story has been an exercise in contrast. Volcanoes are so destructive, but they’re so creative. They’re so powerful in their eruptions but they’re so peaceful.