PENCIL TEST is one of the early test-and-demonstration shorts produced by Pixar not long after Steve Jobs had purchased it from Lucasfilms. Produced on and co-starring Apple equipment, it is a Pinocchio-like story of an icon that wants to be a real pencil and struggles unsuccessfully to live in the real world and in the virtual world.
In it we see Pixar's ability to tell a story through its visual elements and to invest its non-human -- indeed, its non-humanoid -- beings with real character. Although the most famous of these is its Luxo Jr. lamp, which has become the studio's spokesmodel, it shows up beautifully throughout Pixar's history, most recently at length in WALL-E.
In it we see Pixar's ability to tell a story through its visual elements and to invest its non-human -- indeed, its non-humanoid -- beings with real character. Although the most famous of these is its Luxo Jr. lamp, which has become the studio's spokesmodel, it shows up beautifully throughout Pixar's history, most recently at length in WALL-E.
