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General Information

• Pixar Animation Studios is an American computer
  animation studio based in Emeryville, California
  (USA), notable for its seven Academy Awards
• It is best known for its CGI animated feature
  filmssuch as Toy Story, Finding Nemo, and Cars
• Pixar is also known from Photorealistic
  RenderMan, its own implementation of the
  industry-standard Renderman image rendering
  Software, which is used to generate high-quality
  images.
• President Dr. Ed Catmull, also the co-founder
• Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter, also the
  Pixar and Disney Animation Studios Principal
  Creative Advisor

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Early History

• Pixar was founded as the Graphics Group, one
  third of the Computer Division of Lucasfilm
• Eventually, the team began working on film
  sequences and special effects
• Key milestones in films such as Star Trek II The
  Wrath of Khan and Young Sherlock Holmes
• Steve Jobs purchased the group with 10 million

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• The sale reflected George Lucas' desire to stop
  the cash flow losses associated with his 7 year
  research projects associated with new
  entertainment technology tool
• A contributing factor was cash flow difficulties
  following Lucas' 1983 divorce concurrent with the
  sudden drop off in revenues from Star Wars
  licenses following the release of Return of the
  Jedi
• The newly independent company was headed by Dr.
  Catmull, President and CEO, and Dr. Alvy Ray
  Smith, Executive Vice President and Director,
  Jobs served as Chairman of the Board.

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• Initially, Pixar was a high-end computer hardware
  company whose core product was the Pixar Image
  Computer, a system primarily sold to government
  agencies and the medical community.
• One of the leading buyers of Pixar Image
  Computers was Disney studios
• The Image Computer never sold well
• As poor sales of Pixar's computers threatened to
  put the company out of business, Lasseter's
  animation department began producing
  computer-animated commercials for outside
  companies.

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• Early successes included campaigns for Tropicana,
  Listerine, and LifeSavers.
• In 1991 Pixar made a 26 million deal with Disney
  to produce three computer-animated feature films
• The first Film was Toy Story. Pixar was
  re-incorporated on December 9, 1995.
• On January 24, 2006, The Walt Disney Company
  agreed to buy Pixar for 7.4 billion through an
  all-stock transaction

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Production

• Production concentrated on full-scale cartoon
  animation
• Early production mainly consisted of short films
  an tv-commercials
• During the past 12 years, Pixar has produced
  numerous award-winning animation movies
• Toy story(1995), A Bugs Life(1998), Toy Story
  2(1999), Monsters, Inc.(2001), Finding
  Nemo(2003), The Incredibles(2004), Cars(2006),
  Ratatouille(2007)
• A few more films currently in production
• More than 100 different awards and nominations

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• Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
  Awards
• National Academy of Recording Arts Sciences
• Hollywood Foreign Press Association/Golden Globe
  Awards
• Etc.
• The six first films combined have grossed more
  than 3.2 billion at the worldwide box office
• - Six of the top grossing animated films of
  all time

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Pixar University

• Pixar University is an in-house
  professional-development program
• offers more than 110 courses a complete
  filmmaking curriculum, classes on painting,
  drawing, sculpting etc.
• The vision behind the university is for employees
  to try new things, work together better and test
  new ideas
• "We've made the leap from an idea-centered
  business to a people-centered business. Instead
  of developing ideas, we develop people. Instead
  of investing in ideas, we invest in people
  -Randy S. Nelson, the dean of Pixar
  university