Ex-Pixar Artist Authors His Next ‘Greatest Adventure’

Tony Piedra’s book is inspired by the adventure stories his Bahamian father told him when he was a kid.

By Joy DiazSeptember 10, 2018 1:27 pm,

After helping create fantastical worlds in movies like “Up” and “Coco,” Tony Piedra is bringing the same magic to the written word in his latest book, “The Greatest Adventure.”

After years of working at Pixar Animation Studios, where he built environments for some of the studio’s most popular movies, Piedra says he decided to embark on a new artistic challenge.

“I left the studio with the hope and the desire to be able to use the skills I had kind of developed over the years and make something beautiful,” Piedra says.

Piedra based his book on the stories that his father told him when he was a kid. His dad grew up in the Bahamas, and would tell Piedra about how he used to go looking for sharks, or how he and his brother would watch manta rays from his father’s boat. 

“Hearing that as a little kid I was like, ‘Oh my god, that is what I want to experience,’” Piedra says.

Listen to the rest of the interview in the player above.

Written by Acacia Coronado.