Academy Award-winning Animation alumna Domee Shi returns to Sheridan for fireside chat

Just as Turning Red’s main character Meilin Lee had the Daisy Mart and Lee Family Temple, Domee Shi (Bachelor of Animation ‘11) had the nearby Tim Hortons and Rabba Fine Foods to help fuel her during her four years at Sheridan.

“It's always a pleasure to come back to Sheridan. I can't believe it's been 13 years since I graduated,” said Shi before asking the audience of Animation students if her favourite student food options were still around today.

Last month, Shi, who serves as Vice President, Creative at Pixar, returned to Sheridan’s Trafalgar Road Campus for a fireside chat moderated by stop-motion animator, director and story artist Sima Naseem (Bachelor of Animation ‘23).

Third and fourth-year animation students in attendance had the opportunity to ask Shi questions, leading to a discussion centred on authentic storytelling and finding your unique voice.

Shi may be best known as the director of the Academy Award-winning short Bao and the Pixar feature Turning Red, but when she began her studies at Sheridan, directing wasn’t part of the plan. However, it was always clear to her that she enjoyed drawing and loved being able to tell stories through her art. A second-year storyboarding class taught by former professor Nancy Beiman introduced Shi to new career paths within animation.

“I didn’t even really know what [storyboarding] was before I took her class,” said Shi. “Then I realized [it] had everything I loved about animation — you could still draw with your hands, and think about character, acting and compositions.”

But with storytelling comes pitching, which Shi admitted was something that terrified her as a student. However, the more she learned about storyboarding, she realized how important it would be in her profession to be able to communicate big ideas efficiently and effectively.

Today, Shi says she helps her colleagues at Pixar understand her vision by walking them through important story moments using large images and by acting out the emotions the characters are feeling or thinking.

“For Bao and Turning Red, I started off with a little spiel about the inspiration behind the story,” explained Shi. “It’s about finding the universal hook for your audience and the emotional experience that they can [latch] onto. Then pile on all the fun, culturally specific details and nuances that you want to share and put into your movie.”

Fans of Shi’s work will know she often includes personal details about herself in her stories, whether it’s showing her appreciation for Tamagotchi and boy bands or exploring her experiences as an Asian Canadian. A noteworthy example is the inclusion of a toilet paper roll on the mom’s coffee table in Bao as a small nod to the Chinese immigrant home Shi grew up in.

Shi’s attention to detail expands into her latest project, the Pixar feature Elio. With a release date of June 2025, the film follows a young space fanatic who feels like an outsider on Earth and dreams of being abducted by aliens. Similar to the toilet paper roll in Bao, it was important to Shi that Elio’s bedroom share details about who he is as a person.

“Elio’s room is a smattering of alien conspiracy theory posters. His bed, his rug, everything is just alien, alien, alien,” said Shi. “Every single choice that we make in designing for all of our movies is there to help tell the story of the character.”

From red panda plushies to fans dressing up as their favourite characters, Shi’s storytelling resonates with her audiences. “Filmmaking is a two-way street. It is about you expressing yourself, but it’s also about making sure that what you’re expressing is connecting and affecting your audience,” shared Shi.

To wrap up the event, students participated in a short meet and greet with Shi where they had the opportunity to share their personal appreciation for her work and how she has inspired their career journeys.

Learn more about how Sheridan’s Bachelor of Animation program helps empower the next generation of animators to find their unique voice in storytelling.

Explore all the programs the Faculty of Animation, Arts and Design has to offer, including the Computer Animation graduate certificate program.