Photos: Getting an armchair off the ground
Pixar's new film, "Up," centers around a house towed by thousands of balloons. What better way to promote it than with an armchair tugged by a cluster of balloons?
Director filming Up balloons
On Friday, May 8, Pixar hosted a "cluster ballooning" event for the press, which involved a flying armchair suspended below about 64 large, helium-filled balloons. Here, "Up" director Pete Docter takes a ride on the armchair as a film crew documents his adventure.
Clipping new balloons onto the cluster
Team leader and ballooning world record holder Troy Bradley and a group of volunteers got the 64 balloons ready to carry the requisite armchair.
One by one, Bradley and his group clipped new balloons onto the cluster. The process involved distributing them evenly into the cluster, which ultimately was shaped roughly like a lightbulb. The balloons were also distributed evenly by color.
Caribiner connection
Bradley and his team were very focused on safety, probably a good idea given that the people riding the flying armchair Friday were going to be reporters and the director of "Up."
This is one of the many carabiner connections that made up the structural underpinning of the cluster and its tethering to the armchair. The balloons were organized into six sections, called A, B, C, D, E, and F, many of which were denoted by the small labels like the one in this image.
Cluster catching first sun
In order to get the balloon cluster ready for people to ride at 8 a.m. Friday, Bradley and his volunteer team showed up at Pixar's Emeryville, Calif., headquarters at 4 a.m.
Here, as the Friday morning sun crests the trees on the southeastern side of Pixar's campus, it is reflected on the sides of the balloons making up the cluster, even as the team was still inflating balloons and adding them to the cluster.
Chair starting to lift
As more and more balloons were added to the cluster, the armchair began to rise off the ground, even with Carol Bair, a member of Bradley's traveling team, sitting in it.
As more and more balloons were added, multiple people were required to sit on the arms.