Fifteen years ago today was my official hire date at Pixar Animation Studios. Because nobody works for a company for fifteen years anymore, I thought it would be nice to commemorate the occasion by asking some of the people that I have enjoyed working with over the years out to lunch at Hahn’s Hibachi, a Korean barbecue place in Jack London Square. I didn’t bring a camera, but Tom was nice enough to snap this picture of the aftermath.

I’m not the kind of person who spends a great deal of time looking toward the past, but I think it’s good to sit back and consider where you’ve been. I’ve been a part of something really terrific, working for the premier animation company in the world, with some of the best people in the world. To all who showed up, thanks for making the first fifteen years of work enjoyable, exciting, challenging and fun.

I was asked to think of what my greatest Pixar moment was, and it really is hard to pick, since there have been so many. Somewhat arbitrarilly, and yet totally worthy, I chose Jen’s invention of “Digital Dailies Bingo” during production for The Incredibles. This neatly solved the problem of preserving the sanity (what little we may have initially possessed) of the rendering team during a challenging production by allowing us to turn the adversity of having shots kicked back for fixes into a game. Inspired team-building brilliance!

Other big ones:

1. Everything related to Toy Story. The first time I ever wore a tuxedo. My first premiere. The first time I ever saw my name in the credits.
2. Watching h52, the “Hundred Mile Dash” sequence in The Incredibles for the first time in a theater, and listening to everyone cheer at how cool it looks. I think the motion blur did work out really well.
3. Having a $1400 dinner tab for four or five people in Washington D.C. on Motorola as part of the production of Cosmic Voyage. It’s a pity they didn’t spend more money on rendercheck: they managed to misspell both my name and Don’s.
4. Just the day-to-day work of working on Pixar’s RenderMan product, with some very talented software engineers.

To all who showed up to help me celebrate, thanks a bunch for fifteen terrific years.

[tags]Pixar[/tags]

Addendum: Flicker-ized for your enjoyment.