Markus Kranzler

Markus Kranzler

Technical Director at Pixar Animation Studios

Junior Technical Directror / 13 yrs

San Francisco, CA

Character Shading Artist

Inside Out 2 (2024)

Character Shading & Groom Artist

Elemental (2023)

Character Shading & Groom Artist / Character Shading Artist

Turning Red (2022)

Character Shading & Groom Artist

Dug Days (2021)

Character Shading & Groom Artist

Luca (2021)

Characters

22 vs. Earth (2021)

Character Shading Artist

Soul (2020)

Character Modeling And Articulation Artist / Character Shading

SparkShorts (2019)

Character Modeling And Articulation Artist / Character Shading

Purl (2019)

Shot Lighting Artist

Coco (2017)

Character Shading Artist / Shot Lighting Artist

Cars 3 (2017)

Set Dressing Artist

Finding Dory (2016)

Resident Technical Director

The Good Dinosaur (2015)

Visual Effects Artist

Bissige Hunde (2014)

Lead Technical Director

The Present (2014)

Lighting And Rendering Lead

Wedding Cake (2013)

Lighting TD

Iron Man 3 (2013)

First Step Lighting TD Intern

Man of Steel (2013)

First Step Lighting TD Intern

Skyfall (2012)

Lighting Artist / Shading Artist

Natalis (2012)

Stereoscopic Compositor

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010)
Work:

- The Present (2014) (Shading, Lighting, Rendering, Pipeline TD, Groom Artist)
- Wedding Cake (2013) (Lead Lighting TD)
- Superman: Man of Steel (2013) (Lighting/Lookdev TD: MPC)
- Iron Man 3 (2013) (lighting and rendering: Trixter)
- James Bond "Skyfall" (2012) (Lighting TD: MPC)
- Rollin' Safari (2012) (visual effects technical director)
- Natalis (2012) (lighting artist) (shading artist)
- The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010) (stereoscopic compositor: Trixter)

Specialties:
RenderMan (RSL, RIB, DSOs, Slim-Templates)
Maya + MEL
Houdini + Mantra
Nuke
Realflow
Programming (C, C++, Python, Qt, Java)

Lighting & Rendering; Shaderwriting; RnD;
Work History

  • Technical Director

    Pixar

    October 2015 - Present

  • Resident Technical Director

    Pixar

    October 2014 - October 2015

    Generating and dressing volumetric clouds for The Good Dinosaur

  • First Step Lighting TD Intern

    MPC

    July 2012 - August 2012

    Lighting for James Bond "Skyfall"
    Lighting and LookDeving for Superman: Man of Steel

  • Lighting TD

    TRIXTER

    June 2012 - July 2012
    Munich

    Lighting for Iron Man 3 ComicCon-Teaser

  • Shading/Rendering/R&D Intern

    TRIXTER

    April 2010 - December 2010
    Munich

    Writing my thesis about spherical harmonics

  • Tutor

    University of applied sciences Friedberg

    October 2007 - February 2010

    Tutor for elementary students in the graphics department
    Administrator for RenderMan

  • Intern

    weltenbauer.

    April 2009 - August 2009

    In context of my studies this was my second mendatory internship.
    I worked on several projects, giving customer support, worked on the database and went as demoartist to the fmx/09 in Stuttgart

  • 3D Artist

    CMM

    October 2007 - October 2007

    Logo animations for some image-movies for CMM's customer "Dünenhof"

  • Intern

    weltenbauer.

    March 2007 - September 2007

    In context of my studies this was my first mandatory internship.
    I worked on a big project by "Navteq", a huge provider of Maps for navigation systems.
    The task was to build 2100 sights from various citys of europe.
    We had to Build them in 2 levels of detail (200 and 500 triangles), texture them, orient them matching to GPS coordinates and create little renderings.

View All Positions
Education

  • Diploma in Technical Directing

    Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg

    October 2011 - May 2014

  • Diplom Mathematician in Mathematics, Computer Science

    University of Applied Sciences in Friedberg

    2005 - 2011

  • RenderMan Spec in Depth

    TD-College

    2009 - 2009

  • Certified RenderMan Tutor

    Escape Studios

    2008 - 2008