My First (Real) Feature Film Credit

I hit a huge milestone in my career last month, one that I don't think I'll ever forget: I got my first (real) feature film credit.

Why am I prefacing it with (real)? Well, technically I have an intern credit in Spies In Disguise, Blue Sky's last film to release before it was closed. That one was definitely cool, and it was really fun to go see the film in theaters with friends while in college and have them get excited to see my name. However, I actually didn't work on that film - Blue Sky simply gives their interns a credit on whatever film comes out next after their internship. I spent that summer working on Nimona, which as you may already know, was re-done by DNEG after Blue Sky's closure. They gave credits to all the full-time Blue Sky employees on the film, so I missed out on that. So, when Elemental came out in theaters on June 16th, 2023 - that was my true "real" first film credit, in the sense that I actually worked on the film!

It felt extra special because I worked on the film... a lot. Usually people in my department at Pixar spent about 0.5/1 year on a project. In my case, when I first joined Pixar in winter of 2020, I was originally slated to stay on Elemental for 12 weeks. I was so excited about the film and the technical challenges that lied ahead, I requested to stay on for longer. My supervisor said they didn't have much control over that but would see what he could do. Almost 2 years later, I finally wrapped on Elemental. 

It was an amazing experience. I learned so much, and I worked on some incredibly challenging problems. Some of which led me to achieving another milestone - my first accepted talk to a computer graphics conference (link to the paper here). I was lucky to work closely under an industry legend and collaborate with some extremely skilled and knowledgeable colleagues who I can now also call my friends. I was shoulder-to-shoulder with folks who had been at the studio for 20 years, people I looked up to, helping them make this ridiculously complicated film. It was the hardest I've ever worked on something, but also the most rewarding project I've ever worked on.

By the time I wrapped from the film, I was ready to move on, but looking back now, that movie and the projects I did for it were exactly what I wanted out of this career. I wanted to help build something visually stunning, which pushed the boundaries of what is possible in computer graphics. I'm forever going to be grateful for the opportunity.

Back to the credit. So, despite this not being my first time seeing my name on the big screen, this was the first time I teared up. In fact, I was emotional throughout the film's screen-time. I lived through this film from beginning to end, I saw all the hard work so many amazing people did to bring it to the finish line. I felt immense honor and pride to have my name up there. I think many years ago, I thought this type of feeling would come from being in the credits of a Pixar film, and that may have been a part of the emotion - to realize that goal, but I think moreso than that, a majority of the feeling was seeing my name up there surrounded by all the talented folks on the crew who made Elemental possible. 

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