Tuesday, February 03, 2009

Happy Birthday Pixar

It dawns on us that a birthday has crept up:

On February 3rd 1986, 23 years ago today, Pixar was founded. Technically speaking, Pixar began in 1979 as a Graphics Group in the Computer Division of Lucasfilm. But the company did not get named “Pixar” until it was bought by Apple co-founder Steve Jobs in 1986.

Pixar, of course, had a bumpy adolescence, being born of the Lucas empire, adopted by Steve Jobs, and finally embraced by the Mighty Mouse.

Though it now a Bay Area outpost of the Disney conglomerate, we salute its birth. And admire its progeny, each of them movie money spinners.

Here's Tin Toy, a 1988 Pixar short that was a precursor to Toy Story:

3 comments:

Floyd Norman said...

Happy Birthday, Pixar!

I still have my Pixar coffee mug that I bought at a trade show many years ago when the company was trying to sell hardware and software. Plus, everyone said Steve Jobs was nuts to buy this "loser of a company." Even George Lucas dumped it in an effort to raise money.

Who knew?

Anonymous said...

>>Who knew?<<

Uhh. Steve Jobs?


By the way, they still sell software of course. :)

Anonymous said...

For Bay Area denizens, the Computer History Museum in Mountain View has a Pixar imaging computer on display as part of it's historical hardware exhibit. The box looks like their old "lozenge" logo

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