Pixar campus -- and sat down with actor Ed Asner , who lends his voice to Carl ; technical director Steve May ; and co-director Pete Docter to get behind The Scene . Ed Asner : Well , the first 10-15 minutes , that 's a grabber . Nobody can resist it . Steve May : Even though we have a cartoony world , you are trying to make the audience believe that the world and the characters exist . The biggest challenges were a flying house that flies underneath a big canopy of balloons . So , if we can kind of capture that on the computer and animate our balloons to look believable too , then the audience will believe that the house can fly . Pete Docter : There is an amazing group of computer scientists that really approach these things both as an artist but also as a scientist . May : You have thousands of balloons that all interact with each other , and all the balloons have strings , so this is a very complex animation problem . Docter : They think about the physics of the balloons . They bump into each other
-LRB- CNN -RRB- -- With an unbroken chain of blockbuster hits under their belt -- including `` Toy Story , '' `` Finding Nemo , '' `` The Incredibles , '' `` Cars '' and many others -- the talented team of men and women who work for Pixar seem to have the Midas touch . An elderly balloon salesman uproots his house with the help of thousands of balloons in `` Up . '' Their latest endeavor , `` Up , '' follows the life of Carl Fredricksen , a balloon salesman who has recently lost the love of his life , Ellie . Now in his golden years , Carl decides it 's finally time to make Ellie 's lifelong wish come true -- to visit Paradise Falls in South America . He quickly becomes aware he has a stowaway : Russell , a young Wilderness Explorer who 's trying to earn one more merit badge . It 's the unusual form of transportation that Carl chooses that creates the backdrop for this week 's `` The Scene . '' Watch the balloons take off '' CNN traveled to Emeryville , California -- the site of the famous