Since launching Disney+ in 2019, Pixar’s studio page opened with a video of Luxo the Lamp famously stomping out and replacing the letter “I,” borrowed from their studio bumper. This was the one brand we felt we shortchanged at launch - Pixar is infamously a master storyteller and their characters often reflect emotion and growth better than live action films.

I started thinking of how to evolve the lamp (Luxo) to bring in more characters and worlds without jumbling them all together. Pixar is very serious with their worlds and the rules which dictate them - my team worked closely with them to arrive at a potential solution which ultimately didn’t make the cut.

I had an idea that Luxo could become the vessel used to illuminate a variety of worlds and characters. This would allow us to keep the worlds separate, as if each corner of the room was a different world and the light was the entryway into each. Moving away from the Pixar wordmark itself allowed the lamp to represent the unification of all the worlds under a symbolic studio reference.

Initial Storyboards

Animatic Draft

Render from Pixar Animation partners mapping Luxo to our Animatic

Proposed Concept

This concept was scrapped for an alternative design we were simultaneously pursuing which ultimately fit better with the simplicity and immersion we were looking for. Sometimes being bolder is better than evolving something that should have never been.

Storyboards by Diana Torres, Sr. Product Designer, TWDC.