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Ed Catmull- President, Co-founder of Pixar Animation Studios and creator of “Toy Story”

Her Campus Placeholder Avatar Alexis Jones
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Utah chapter.

Pixar founder, graduate of the University of Utah, Oscar winner, and member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Ed Catmull, will be the speaker for Commencement in May.  
 
Catmul is the president and cofounder of Pixar Animation Studios, and the creator of “Toy Story,” the film that revolutionized the film industry as the first full-length feature film entirely generated by computer graphics.
 
Catmull received a Bachelors of science in physics and computer science, and a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Utah while working on computer graphics in the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) at the university.
 
He received an Oscar in 2001 for “for significant advancements to the field of motion picture rendering as exemplified in Pixar’s RenderMan,” and the Gordon E. Sawyer Award in 2009 for his technological contributions to the industry.
 
As one of the most popular alumni of the university, we are excited to welcome Catmull to the university for commencement. 

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Lexi Jones is a senior with a double major in journalism and anthropology at the University of Utah. Born and raised in Salt Lake City, she loves exploring the outdoors, rock climbing, music, and writing. She is currently a museum aid for the Bureau of Land Management. She has interned with LDS Living magazine as a writer, the Utah Museum of Natural History in the anthropology lab, and the National Society of Leadership and Success as a founding chapter president. Her inspirations are Mark Twain and Paulo Coelho. Lexi aspires to be a freelancer for National Geographic. Always pursuing multiple passions, she is currently applying to graduate school for a Masters in archaeology and a Juris doctorate, and yes, she does plan to enroll in both at the same time.