Imagire, 62, said her work as production designer for the film included a research trip early in production to Yellowstone National Park with a group that included the film\u2019s head of story, a producer and director Daniel Chong. On the trip, a local guide took them to a beaver lodge that was abandoned and they could crawl inside.<\/p>\n
Imagire, who grew up in Greenhaven and graduated from Kennedy High School in 1981, recalled attending an art class inside of Sacramento Zoo as a girl.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe used all these different materials, but drew animals,\u201d Imagire said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s so funny, now that I am talking to you about it, it\u2019s sort of come full circle with \u2018Hoppers.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
What Imagire\u2019s work on \u2018Hoppers\u2019 entailed<\/p>\n
Major Hollywood names draw attention whenever a new Pixar film comes out, whether it is Tom Hanks voicing Woody for the \u201cToy Story\u201d franchise or Brad Bird directing \u201cThe Incredibles.\u201d<\/p>\n
But capable veterans like Imagire do the heavy lifting to help realize the vision. Pixar designer Fran Kalal, who worked with Imagire on designing animated costumes for \u201cThe Incredibles 2,\u201d told the San Francisco Chronicle in 2018<\/a> that she was \u201cable to to be recognized and taken seriously because someone like Bryn was there this whole time kicking butt.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHoppers\u201d marks Imagire\u2019s highest-profile Pixar credit to date. It put her in close partnership with Chong, who previously worked on \u201cInside Out\u201d and \u201cCars 2,\u201d among other Pixar films. \u201cMy job was to work with Daniel, and really kind of visualize his idea of the film and take it to screen,\u201d Imagire said.<\/p>\n She said she worked with Chong to view the design of the film\u2019s lighting, sets and characters \u201call the way through from the beginning of design to the end of the movie, the final film frames.\u201d<\/p>\n The work could be painstaking. Imagire said she built many models of trees to help create the film\u2019s natural look. Then there was the research trip to Yellowstone, where the guide showed Pixar staffers the beaver lodge.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was really surprising how homey and comfortable it felt, even though beavers weren\u2019t living there at the time,\u201d Imagire said. \u201cIt was really interesting to see the inside construction and the mud mixed with the branches and this really soft kind of like leafy, leafy floor.\u201d<\/p>\n She also made a research trip to Colorado, since part of Imagire\u2019s job as production designer was to plan the film\u2019s location and environments.<\/p>\n \u201cWe started out using the Pacific Northwest, but there was something about that palette, I think it was too limited for me,\u201d Imagire said. \u201cIt was just, you know, gray sky, really dark green of the trees and brown.\u201d<\/p>\n Imagire favored Colorado, both for its wider range of colors and \u201cbecause they have tons of aspen trees and so aspens are a beaver\u2019s favorite food.\u201d<\/p>\n Imagire\u2019s Sacramento roots<\/p>\n The oldest of three sisters, Imagire was born in Sacramento in 1963 to Japanese-American parents Arthur and Gloria Imagire.<\/p>\n Arthur Imagire was an engineer for what was then known as Aerojet Solid Propulsion Company. He had grown up in Oakland, where his mother operated a sewing school and designed formal ball gowns. His family moved to Reno, Nevada, to avoid the Japanese internment during World War II.<\/p>\n Bryn Imagire remembers the shop her grandmother opened in Reno. \u201cI always remember just like running through there and just feeling all the different materials,\u201d she said. \u201cSo it must have had some kind of effect on me.\u201d<\/p>\n Gloria Imagire had been interned at Gila River War Relocation Center near Phoenix during the war and later studied nursing at University of California, San Francisco. Now 90, she remembered telling her daughter how limited opportunities had once been for girls of Japanese descent.<\/p>\n \u201cI said the sky was the limit for them, so they should just go for whatever they want to do,\u201d Gloria Imagire said.<\/p>\n Bryn Imagire grew up in south Sacramento, moving to Greenhaven around kindergarten. She attended Kennedy High School. \u201cI wasn\u2019t a really great student, but I was really great at knowing what I love to do,\u201d Imagire said. \u201cI love to draw and paint and make things.\u201d<\/p>\n At Kennedy, she took a sign-making class, helping create posters for basketball and football games. \u201cIt was such a good training for me, for my eye and just mixing paints and being in that sort of creative collaborative environment,\u201d Imagire said.<\/p>\n She attended American River College before earning a bachelor\u2019s degree in illustration from ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena.<\/p>\n After college she returned to Sacramento and got a job at Dane Henas Design.<\/p>\n \u201cWe didn\u2019t even know that she was this amazing illustrator and artist,\u201d said Wendy Heaton, now one of the firm\u2019s principals.<\/p>\n The other principal, Dane Henas, who started the firm in 1979, said Imagire was shy when it came to sharing her artistic ability. This contrasted with her otherwise outgoing personality and sense of humor. \u201cShe wasn\u2019t shy in any other way,\u201d Henas said.<\/p>\n The company eventually put Imagire\u2019s artistic skill to use for illustration work it still has at its offices: tortilla packaging, a flyer for a cruise-themed party and a program for the Sacramento Opera Association.<\/p>\n Heaton marveled at Imagire\u2019s Pixar career.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s great to see somebody with that much talent go and make something of it like that,\u201d Heaton said.<\/p>\n Getting to Pixar<\/p>\n Imagire was hired at Pixar in 1996 while the company was working on its 1998 film, \u201cA Bug\u2019s Life,\u201d by Tia Kratter, who was impressed by her sample work.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you\u2019re looking for a good artist, you look for the worst piece in their portfolio,\u201d Kratter said. \u201cI knew that she would be able to deliver really consistently high-quality art when it came to doing our films.\u201d<\/p>\n Imagire started off with humble tasks for Pixar, doing visual effects work on \u201cA Bug\u2019s Life\u201d and shading for \u201cToy Story 2,\u201d which came out in 1999. Her IMDB page shows numerous high-profile Pixar credits since then, including shading work or art direction on \u201cThe Incredibles,\u201d \u201cRatatouille\u201d and \u201cUp.\u201d<\/p>\n In her time at Pixar, Imagire has won Art Directors Guild awards for her work on 2018 film \u201cCoco\u201d and 2021 film \u201cSoul\u201d and an Annie Award for \u201cCoco.\u201d<\/p>\n Kratter is impressed with the determination of Imagire, who stands just under 5 feet tall, calling her \u201csmall but mighty.\u201d In Imagire, Kratter also found a valued confidante, a necessity for their industry.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were supposed to be very strong women, but we\u2026 found a great sense of camaraderie and sympathy for each other in a world that, back in the late \u201990s and early aughts, was very male-dominated,\u201d said Kratter, who left Pixar in 2021 and now works for Disney.<\/p>\n Imagire\u2019s mother, who said the family is \u201cso proud of\u201d her, remembered the early part of her Pixar career.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen we used to go to those movies her name was real small at the bottom,\u201d Gloria Imagire said. \u201cThe family would just sit \u2018til the end to see her name come up. But now it comes up big and towards the front. So she\u2019s done really well. She\u2019s worked really hard.\u201d<\/p>\n Bryn Imagire said she is currently working on \u201cIncredibles 3,\u201d which is slated for a 2028 release.<\/p>\n \u201cI love my job and I love working and I love creating,\u201d Imagire said. \u201cTo be able to think about a movie when it\u2019s in its very infancy and very beginning, when it\u2019s this very nebulous blob and then seeing it finished on the screen at the end is just like the most rewarding thing.\u201d<\/p>\n This story was originally published March 15, 2026 at 5:00 AM.<\/p>\n Related Stories from Sacramento Bee<\/p>\n![\"Bryn](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/20250918_BrynImagire_262.jpg\" "\\"20250918_BrynImagire_262.jpg\\"")
Bryn Imagire, production designer for the new Pixar film “Hoppers,” at the company’s studios in Emeryville. Stephanie Martinez-Arndt Pixar <\/p>\n
![\"Profile](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/SAC_4089_GrahamWomack_HA_250908.jpg\")