The Making Of Zootopia 2 With Maya
See how Disney's team managed over 2,000 shots and tackled all the tricky technical challenges behind the scenes.
Disney's Zootopia 2 has been met with an extraordinary reception, surpassing 2019's Frozen 2 to become the studio's highest-grossing film ever, and it has just won the BAFTA for Best Animated Film. In the latest behind-the-scenes video, Producer Yvett Merino, Layout Supervisor Dorian Bustamante, and Environment Modeling Supervisor Chris O'Connell give a look at the production process and the role of Maya in it.
Zootopia 2 features approximately 2,055 shots, well above the typical Disney film average of around 1,600. The film includes 42 sequences and over 8,000 individual elements modeled for its new, large, and complex environments. Maya was used across nearly every department for modeling assets, building sets, and keeping the team coordinated, while Flow Production Tracking (formerly ShotGrid) made sure production ran smoothly.
Some fun facts about Zootopia 2: a total of 697 crew members worked together to bring the film to life. There are 178 unique characters across 67 species, and look development artists crafted fur and hair for dozens of animals, from about 570,000 hairs on Nibbles Maplestick to more than 9.6 million hairs on each giraffe. The desert festival scene alone has over 50,000 characters.
Zootopia 2
Gary De'Snake proved to be a unique technical challenge. The new character features 3,000 sculpted 3D scales, nearly 450 on his head, 160 on his belly, and almost 2,400 on his back. To bring them to life, the Zootopia 2's Effects Animation team developed a custom scale-authoring tool called Scute, enabling interactive placement, growth control, and profile shaping to achieve movement that feels both art-directed and believable.
Zootopia 2
For the water-tube chase with Gary, Judy, and Nick, there was no existing animation reference or simulation technology to rely on, so the Cinematography team created their own.
They built practical tubes, filled them with water, and tested shots inside them using a real camera to study how light and movement would behave. The team also created new technology to simulate dielectric materials, allowing art-directed light to pass through the glass and water in a way that felt natural on screen.
We've shared some Zootopia 2 behind-the-scenes content before, if you're curious, here's a look at the car chase scene and the worm sequence:
This March, Zootopia 2 is competing in the 2026 Oscar race for Best Animated Feature. Subscribe to our Newsletter and join our 80 Level Talent platform, follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, and Instagram, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.
