Resources
Animators
Pixar Animation Studio
Pixar, the computer animation studio, started off as the computer division of George Lucas's Industrial Light and Magic special effects company. It was headed by Ed Catmull, a computer scientist who specialised in texture-mapping and rendering software, and amongst its employees was a young animator, John Lasseter. In 1986 the ILM computer division was sold to Steve Jobs, co- founder of Apple Computers, who relaunched it as Pixar.
In its first few years Pixar largely existed as a software developer and maker of short computer-animated films, which was essentially a way of testing its products. One of these films is regarded as a landmark in the development of computer animation. At first glance, Luxo Jr. (1986) does not look very promising - it's a film about two desk lamps and a ball: an excellent vehicle to demonstrate the rendering software that the company had developed - but in John Lasseter's hands it blossomed into a story of a father and son relationship, imbued with humour and pathos. Luxo Jr. showed that computer animation had other uses than the usual sci-fi robots and androids. Lasseter built on this success and his 1989 short Tin Toy won him his first Oscar.
In 1991, Pixar entered into an agreement with Disney to produce three feature films. The first of these was Toy Story, directed by Lasseter. It was the first fully computer-animated feature film. Toy Story's huge success convinced Hollywood that computer animation was the way forward (it had been uncertain about the viability of the medium following the commercial failure of Tron in the 1980s). Studios began investing in computer animation, notably ex-Disney executive Jeffrey Katzenberg who set up an animation studio as part of the new production company, DreamWorks. Its first production, Antz (1998) looked to be a direct challenge to Pixar's next feature A Bug's Life.
Since Toy Story, Pixar has continued to evolve as an amalgam of computer software developer and animation studio with its RenderMan software widely used throughout the animation and special effects industry. It continues to make short films - Jan Pinkava's Geri's Game (1997) won an Oscar - and its features continue to achieve commercial and artistic success.
Further reading
John Lasseter and Steve Daily Toy Story: the Art and Making of the Animated Film (Hyperion, US, 1995)
Selected films
Luxo Jr (1986)
Tin Toy (1989)
Toy Story (1995)
Geri's Game (1997)
A Bug's Life (1998)
Toy Story 2 (1999)
Monsters Inc. (2001)
Finding Nemo (2003)
The Incredibles (2004)