This year at Annecy, special guest speakers from Pixar will reveal a bit of the creative and technical magic behind Pixar's feature films, with a focus on the rendering
techniques that make Pixar's films so visually appealing.
Per Christensen - Senior RenderMan Developer
Per Christensen is a senior software developer in Pixar's RenderMan group. His main research interest is efficient ray tracing and global illumination in very complex scenes. He has also worked at Mental Images in Berlin and at Square USA in Honolulu, and holds a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Washington in Seattle. His movie credits include the last six Pixar movies.
Jason Boose - Pixar Animator
Jason Boose joined Pixar Animation Studios in March 2004. Brought on as an animator, Boose has worked on a number of projects including the 2006 feature Cars and the Academy Award®-winning features Ratatouille and WALL-E. He also animated for the 2D short film Your Friend the Rat, and on the Oscar®-nominated short Presto. Boose most recently finished working on Disney-Pixar's upcoming film Up, scheduled to release on May 29, 2009.
As an animator Boose helped to bring life to the films' characters, making them act and emote in a believable manner. After seeing Disney's Beauty and the Beast for the first time he was inspired, realizing he could combine his love for drawing and movies in one profession.
Prior to coming to Pixar, Boose worked at Disney as an animator on Lilo & Stitch and Brother Bear. He was an assistant animator on Mulan and Tarzan.
Raised in Ontario, Canada, Boose attended Sheridan College where he studied animation. He currently lives in the Bay Area.
Sarah Mercey-Boose - Pixar Animator
Sarah Mercey joined Pixar Animation Studios in March 2004. She started as a computer animator on the Golden Globe®-winning feature Cars, and continued on to work on the Academy Award®-winning Ratatouille and WALL•E. Mercey also worked on two of Pixar’s short films, doing traditional hand drawn animation on Your Friend the Rat and computer animation on Partly Cloudy which was released with Disney•Pixar’s latest feature, Up. Mercey is currently working on Toy Story 3, scheduled for release on June 18, 2010.
After growing up drawing and watching movies, it was only upon seeing Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin that it truly occurred to her that people were drawing these movies, and that she wanted to be one of them. A high school teacher pointed Mercey in the direction of Sheridan College in Oakville, Ontario for their Classical Animation courses.
During her time at Sheridan, Mercey worked doing animation posing for a company called Lacewood. After graduating with a degree in Classical Animation, she was hired by Walt Disney Feature Animation in Florida where she contributed her talents to a number of feature films including Mulan, Tarzan, Emperor’s New Groove, Lilo and Stitch, and Brother Bear.
Mercey grew up in Elmira, Ontario, Canada and now lives in Berkeley, California with her husband.
Bob Peterson - Pixar Co-Director & Screenwriter
Bob Peterson has been a key player at Pixar Animation Studios since 1994. His first assignment was that of layout artist and animator on Toy Story. He later served as story artist on A Bug's Life and Toy Story 2, story supervisor on Monsters, Inc. and was also one of the screenwriters on the Academy Award winning feature Finding Nemo. Peterson's most recent credit is as co-director and writer of DisneyoPixar's upcoming feature film Up, scheduled for release on May 29, 2009.
In addition to his story work, Peterson has voiced several of the company's memorable animated characters: the aged chess-playing hero of Geri's Game, paperwork-obsessed slug-woman Roz in Monsters, Inc. and the tuneful teacher Mr. Ray in Finding Nemo. He also lends his voice talents to Up for the character of Dug the dog.
While studying for a master's degree in mechanical engineering at Indiana's Purdue University, Peterson had his first experience working in a computer graphics lab. It was there that he also received his first cartooning experience, writing and drawing Loco-Motives, a daily four-panel strip for Purdue University's Exponent newspaper.
Following graduation, Peterson moved to Santa Barbara, California, to work for Maya creator, Wavefront Technologies, and then to Hollywood based Rezn8 Productions, before joining Pixar in 1994.
Born in Wooster, Ohio and raised in Brooklyn, New York and Dover, Ohio, Peterson earned his undergrad degree from Ohio Northern University. He currently lives in San Francisco with his wife, three children and two non-talking dogs.
Dylan Sisson - Pixar's RenderMan Technical Artist
A passionate interest in art and technology at an early age led Dylan Sisson to join the RenderMan Products Group at Pixar Animation Studios. Since his arrival at the studio in 1999, Dylan has been engaged in the development of the RenderMan Studio and RenderMan for Maya which are used to render CG imagery for film and animation. He is also the creator of RenderMan's infamous walking teapot. Currently, Dylan is working on the next generation of the RenderMan tools.
Prior to Pixar, Dylan began his career writing and illustrating comic books, before beginning a career in 2D animation. From there it was a short step into 3D production for games and commercials.
An active artist, Dylan's digital artwork has been shown at industry events such as SIGGRAPH, and he is also the creator of several award-winning independent animated shorts, one of which received a rather cold screening at the South Pole, Antarctica.
Peter Sohn - Pixar Story Artist, Animator, Director, & Voice of Emile
Peter Sohn started working for Pixar Animation Studios in September 2000, where he worked in both the art and story departments for Finding Nemo. Sohn then began work on The Incredibles in the art, story, and animation departments. He focused on animating members of the Parr family and worked on many memorable scenes from the film. On the Academy Award®-winning feature Ratatouille, Sohn not only worked as a story artist and animator for the film, but also served as the voice of Emile. He also worked as a story artist on another Oscar® winner, the 2008 feature film, WALL•E.
In his directorial debut, Sohn is working with producer Kevin Reher on a new short film, Partly Cloudy, set to release with DisneyoPixar's feature film Up on May 29, 2009.
Prior to Pixar, Sohn worked at Warner Bros. with Ratatouille director Brad Bird on The Iron Giant, as well as at Disney TV. He grew up in New York and attended California Institute of the Arts (Cal Arts). He currently lives in the Bay Area.
Carlo Vogele - Pixar Animator
Born in Luxembourg, Carlo Vogele studied theatre art in Berlin for 5 years. He then went on to attend the Gobelins School of Animation in Paris. During his 3-year program at Gobelins, Vogele learned the craft of traditional hand drawn animation. He also became familiar with stop motion techniques while attending a summer workshop in Bristol, UK and discovered computer graphic animation while interning at Framestore CFC in London.
During an exchange semester at the California Institute of the Arts (Cal Arts), Vogele completed his final student film, For Socks' Sake, winner of the Walter Lantz "Woody" award. For Socks' Sake also won the Best Animation award at IMAGINA 2008 in Monaco, Best Director at ANIWOW in Beijing and Best Stop Motion at ANIMEX in the UK. It is also is nominated for Best Student Film at the 2009 Annecy Film Festival.
Vogele joined Pixar Animation Studios in July 2008. He is currently working as an animator on DisneyoPixar's Toy Story 3, scheduled for release on June 18, 2010.
