Ed Catmull Quotes
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The need to challenge the status quo is just more obvious when you're failing than when you're succeeding. But it's no less urgent.
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In the early 1970s, I headed to graduate school at the University of Utah and joined the pioneering program in computer graphics because I realized that's where I could combine my interests in art and computer science.
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My best advice came by examples. A supportive environment at home, school, and grad school. Support at the New York Institute of Technology, then George Lucas, Steve Jobs, and Bob Iger. The examples meant that I should support other people, even when things aren't going well. It will pay off.
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It is not the manager's job to prevent risks. It is the manager's job to make it safe to take them.
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One term that's used in this industry a lot is this notion of 'feeding the beast.' You've got all of these people whose livelihoods are dependent on it. There are enormous pressures to keep material going into it, and the pressures to feed it are not irrational. They're the basis of your business.
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What happened in the early days of Disney is that Walt Disney used all of the new technologies as they came out. When matting came out, they adopted it. They adopted sound and color and xerography. Walt did that. And then, when he died, people began to think that this is just about making films, so they stopped bringing in new technologies.
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Linear narrative is an artfully-directed telling of a story, where the lighting and the sound is all for a very clear purpose. You're not just wandering around in the world.
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When I see a film, I'll remember that there was a time when it wasn't working, and there was some pain and angst in order to get it to work.
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When I was young, it was television that was taking off, and so you had people worried that people were spending too much time watching television.
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I can't look at 'WALL-E' or 'Finding Nemo' or 'Up' and look at in the same way as people outside of the company would look at it. Each one of them had angst.
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If you put out 20 films, you hope that a number are successful. It's like human reproduction versus frog reproduction. Frogs produce thousands and hope a few succeed. Humans don't produce many babies but put a lot of energy into them, which is kind of where we are. They still don't always succeed, but you try a lot harder.
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If something works, you shouldn't do it again. We want to do something that is new, original - something where there's a good chance of failure.
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Technical understanding should be a core competency of any company.
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The Pixar name means more than any other name. It's very important to us to keep that name at a high level.
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I did like 'Despicable Me.' I thought it was quite good.
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We have a whole industry which is gigantic: games. Games is very successful. It's its own art form, though, and it's not the same as a linear narrative.
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I've really thought a lot about why other companies fail or succeed. I had to be a student of failure and find out why things went off the rails. I did that at a fairly deep level, and it's still something I do.
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I liked the first 'Kung Fu Panda.'
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I actually feel awkward being at the center of attention.
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With every one of our films, we try to touch emotions, but we don't try to touch the same emotions each time.