Animation has always been about technology. You can't have animation without technology.

Fox came to us with the concept for ICE AGE and they came to us with the first draft of the script. They also gave us a mandate to make it into a comedy from what was previously a rather dramatic action concept.

Animation has always been about technology. You can't have animation without technology.

I think I probably am doing animation because I started as a kid and I learned on my own, and I worked by myself a lot. It's the only thing I really prepared myself to do in any kind of depth. And I've just kind of imbibed the technology and techniques and the thinking about telling stories this way. It just feels natural to me.

For me, part of the fascination with making animation is you go to a place; it's a complete immersion in someone else's fantasy.

Honestly, I don't go out of my way to see animated movies. I'm mostly influenced by.. the films I tend to like are the small films, small personal stories. With characters you can believe.

You look at Japan and Hayao Miyazaki's films are the biggest films ever made in Japan; domestically there and they play to critical acclaim around the world. He won't put more then 5 or 10 percent computer imagery in his movies. It's disappointing to me. It's a silly choice that some studios made to move out of animation. It's part of the unfortuneate preconception that I think the public has going into see animation.