Pixar Presentation
By Jessica Shock
Last night’s employer presentation at Arnold Hall marked a big moment in animation history for SCAD. For the first time, Pixar representatives came out to visit and talk about internships. The guests included Peggy Dollaghan, Pixar’s Senior Technical Recruiter, Director of Technical Artists Pamela Clay, and animator Erik Ehle.
Dollaghan opened up presentation with a down-to-earth manner that only became more relaxed as her associates easily chimed in with funny side-stories or tips as the lecture went on. It was a refreshing change of pace that students rarely get to experience from visiting companies, let alone that of the biggest studio sized at 1, 200 employees.
“The culture at Pixar is a very strong one,” Dollaghan began. “It goes back all the way to the beginning, and the whole focus really is just to foster creativity.” To make her point, Dollaghan showed a slide of John Lasseter’s office: a garden shed with a plastic basket-ball hoop mounted on the outside.
“The garden shed is an animator’s space,” she explained. “Back in the day, as we were growing, we put the animators into cubes and they didn’t want that. So they said, ‘We could go to Home Depot and buy these garden sheds.’”
“The cubicles are way too sterile,” Ehle jumped in. “People have decorated the sheds. One woman cut the top off and built a second story. We’ve even got a couple of hidden rooms.”
“We have the guy that modeled the shark in ‘Nemo.’ He was given a shark, so he cut the shape of Bruce out of his wall, and he had the head coming into his office, and then the tail on the outside. It was great,” Clay added.
Talk about creative freedom.
After introducing us to what it means to work at Pixar, Dollaghan really got to the meat of the matter: “We’ve got a couple of internships.”
The three types Pixar offers are split up into Classroom Based, Residencies, and Internships.
“These internships are typically offered year-round, and the bulk of them are in the summer. We hire based on what’s needed at that time. Some internships can be typically 12 weeks to three months. Others can be, in some instances, up to six months long, depending on the availability of the candidate and what we’re looking for,” Dollaghan explained.
The internships apply to a wide range of creatives. Pixar hires for technical, creative, productions and operations, character design, set design, graphics, and quite a few more.
“Classroom based training is offered in story, animation, and the Pixar Undergraduate Program known as PUP.” This internship is reserved for the less experienced sophomore or junior. According to Dollaghan, “the PUP program is a 10-week long course. Different technical directors in different areas of expertise come in and teach a week long class, you get assignments, about week seven you get put into a group project, and by the last week you work on a solo project. And then on the last week – almost the last day – we invite everyone from the studio to the Steve Jobs Theater and the PUPs present back their work.”
“We also have residencies,” Dollaghan continued. “Those are recent graduates. It’s one-year long, and the hope is that during the year the person is doing well so that we convert them to a regular full-time employee. But during the internship you’re paid a salary, you’re benefited, so you get the perks of a full-time employee.”
Those interested can apply at www.pixar.com and receive all the perks of being a Pixar intern: pay, housing, transportation, possible relocation assistance, and full benefits. Interns can also attend the range of courses offered at Pixar University.
“It’s like a mini-college within the studio that offers every kind of course from Health and Well-Being to Gesture Drawing,” Dollaghan said. “Erik just taught a class titled, ‘Animation for the Non-Animator.’”
“We had Math for Poetry recently,” Clay added.
For their final piece of advice, the group advised the students to “edit, edit, edit” their demo reel or portfolio. They want to be able to trust the student’s eye so they won’t be left second-guessing their talent.
