Since one needs to be a registered user of The McKinsey Quarterly to be able to read the complete article, here is the link to a very nice review and concise version of it from Gigaom.com by Carleen Hawn. It begins like this:

This week The McKinsey Quaterly asks: what does stimulating the creativity of animators have in common with developing new product ideas or technology breakthroughs? Apparently, a lot.

In Innovation lessons from Pixar, McKinsey writes:

Brad Bird makes his living fostering creativity. Academy Award-winning director (The Incredibles and Ratatouille) talks about the importance, in his work, of pushing teams beyond their comfort zones, encouraging dissent, and building morale. He also explained the value of “black sheep”—restless contributors with unconventional ideas.

Read the complete aticle from Gigaom.com here.

If you would like to read the original article that came out in The McKinsey Quarterly, go here.
A quick look at what the original article says:

• Pixar’s Brad Bird makes his living fostering creativity. In an interview, this director of two Academy Award–winning animated films (The Incredibles and Ratatouille) describes how he pushes teams of animators beyond their comfort zones, encourages dissent, and builds morale.
• Bird’s experiences and anecdotes hold powerful lessons for executives in any organization seeking to nurture innovation.

The article also contains an interactive feature including audio clips from the interview, stills from several of Bird’s projects, and a brief biography.

You can register online by going to: lasjedi.com/events Though entry is free, there is limited seating so if you want to attend, you better hurry up!

Nigel Sumner has worked on numerous Hollywood films as Sequence Supervisor and from the poster, I am assuming that he will be talking about his work on the Hollywood VFX-rich film, - Transformers.

To know more about Nigel Sumner, you can read this interview from ILMfan.com (It’s an old interview but it should help you get some idea about the speaker and his past work): Read the interview.

Nigel Sumner - Filmography:

Transformers (2007)
Role: Effects Supervisor

Eragon (2006)
Role: Digital Effects Artist

Poseidon (2006)
Role: Digital Effects Artist

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005)
Role: Digital Effects Artist

War of the Worlds (2005)
Role: Visual Effects Supervisor

Van Helsing (2004)
Role: Animation Supervisor

Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004)
Role: CGI Artist

The Hulk (2003)
Role: Technical Director

Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003)
Role: Supervisor

Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones (2002)
Role: Visual Effects

Jurassic Park III (2001)
Role: Graphic Artist

(information courtesy - movies.nytimes.com)

“Forget the films, Watch the titles”

This site showcases some very well crafted title sequences for films and TV shows. Classified into 4 categories - Animation, Motion Graphics, Mixed Media and 3D, it has some popular film titles (Pink Panther, Juno) as well as some which we haven’t seen before in India. The site was set up in 1997 as an online collection of some of the most brilliant and eye-catching title sequences made for mainstream as well as independent films. On the FAQs on their website, they tell us WHY they are doing this…

“Because we love a good title sequence, because we’re into innovative motion graphics, because we can… Femke Wolting, founder of Submarine Channel, curated a program for the International Film Festival Rotterdam several years ago where she showed a selection of the best title sequence designs. That program was called ‘Forget the Film, Watch the Titles’. SubmarineChannel editor Remco Vlaanderen has been collecting and researching title sequences for several years. We’re quite passionate about the subject! “

Worth viewing for sure! Check it out…