A Trip to Avalanche Software

Yesterday I got the amazing opportunity to tour Avalanche Software's studio in downtown Salt Lake City. A few months ago a man named Thomas Estrada offered to show me around the building that Disney Infinity is made. Hard to believe it's made here in Utah, of all places. When arriving the magic began immediately, seeing different concept drawings, and 3D printed figures. We met with Thomas and he showed us around the different departments and lead us to his space. Thomas is the Cinematic's Animation Supervisor/Senior Animator. He brought up a character to show us how he can make them move around how he likes, and explained to us the whole process of a characters development, he examples Luke Skywalker, one of the characters he worked on. He also has worked on Mike from Monsters University, Rocket Raccoon from Guardians of the Galaxy, Sorcerer Apprentice Mickey, and Olaf from Frozen. It was really amazing to see where the magic happens to bring all the toys to life for real, and can't thank Thomas enough for spending time to deliver the opportunity. We got to know Thomas along the way and his personal journey to making it where he is today. We went to lunch after he showed us around and we got to get to know one another. It was really cool to see it all and he even let me keep an original drawing of Yzma from The Emperors New Groove, a film he worked on among others. I will never forget this day, the day that Thomas really put the title "Toys to life" to a whole new degree.

That's very cool! Sounds like a great guy. Glad you got to experience visiting Avalanche.

I'm sure everyone is curious about the Wolverine concept art...

I know, I just realized that, maybe shouldn't of posted the pic for debate reasons haha, oh well it was still awesome!

Ooooh wolverine

There's concept art of lots of characters that aren't in game such as beast so wouldn't worry about it. Looks awesome, great opportunity

Thomas is an awesome person and excellent animator. I remember watching him participate in a podcast a few months ago where he talked about the movies he worked on and the experience it was. I ended up talking a bit with him on twitter later on. His twitter is @felixbrownSLC.

Jazz820, if you are unsure about the photos just ask him he it is okay to post them.

@Jazz820 - thanks for posting, cool stuff. Thomas designed some of the coolest Infinity characters .

As a visitor to the Studios, you probably had to be cleared for photos, right? You can't be the first visitor - seems unlikely that sensitive material would be in a display case available to guest tours.

WOLVERINE AND TREASURE PLANET HAVE AT LEAST BEEN CONSIDERED, THIS IS HUGE!!!

Wow, this is very cool! You're very lucky to have been given this opportunity and I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Also very intriguing that Wolverine has had some concept art. At least they're thinking about him. I'm not at all keen on that costume though, is that what he's wearing in the modern comics? Last I saw him in the comics he was wearing Silver/Black, and he had a variation of his old tan costume in USM. Hopefully when he gets made he gets either his original tiger stripe or tan costumes :p.