Pixar’s highly experienced digital artist shares how he spends a typical working day, and offers his expert advice

NAME Dylan Sisson

JOB TITLE Digital artist, RenderMan

STUDIO Pixar Animation Studios

LOCATION USA

ABOUT After joining Pixar in 1999, Dylan has worked in RenderMan Products, while creating personal artwork in emerging media.

WEB www.dylansisson.com

As a digital artist in the RenderMan group, I have a number of responsibilities including managing marketing, creating demos, interacting with our users, and giving presentations at industry conferences, so I spend a fair amount of time on the road (at least before I started sheltering in place). I also spend a lot of time in RenderMan, making images. I have a lot of freedom to creatively explore ideas and concepts which is great, and there is always new technology to learn as well which keeps things interesting. I will often get to try out new technology before it’s released, like NPR stylized rendering.

How do you get started and set yourself up for the day ahead?

My routine is simple, and quite possibly boring. I like to exercise in the morning, and clear my head before jumping onto the computer. Earlier in the day is when I take care of emails, planning, and minutia, and for the rest of the day I’ll focus on one project in depth. I usually forget to eat lunch.

What kind of day-to-day challenges do you face?

One of the challenges is managing the unexpected… it happens with the technology, planning, events, travel, everything. Especially when travelling on the road. From time to time, I’ll be in a situation where the challenges are completely unanticipated. For instance, once I gave a two-hour presentation in a freezing auditorium, and during a break I was brought a bottle of water from the hallway. It was frozen solid. It was literally freezing. So I’ve learned to expect the unexpected, and try to keep a sense of humour about it.