I have been a Lighting Artist and Supervisor and I have worked on many of the projects since 2005. Lighting's contribution is taking all the upstream work (animation, models, textures, fx) to a final image which establishes the emotion and mood of a scene or sequence visually. We work closely with the production designers and visual development teams to ensure those intended goals are met.

The Inside the Portal sequence of Big Hero 6 was a lot of fun. We were working closely with Effects and with a brand new renderer (Hyperion). The icing on top was winning a Visual Effects Society Award for the sequence.

Be curious, learn lots and value relationships.

Pinocchio was my favorite. It embodied a lot of what I had been internalizing as a child. You are plopped into this crazy world and have to find your own way to becoming a fully, actualized human being. It's also beautiful to watch.

Besides a strong grasp of the fundamentals, I tend to look for the artist's voice and how well they make attempts to tell a story with their work. Not just a narrative but even with still images, an emphasis on exploring lighting to enhance personality on characters and mood in environments usually helps. If the work evokes emotion, that is a huge plus.