Ralph Guggenheim (born June 6, 1951) is an American video graphics designer and film producer. He won a

Producers Guild of America Award Producer(s), The Producer(s), or co-producer(s) may refer to: Occupations *Producer (agriculture), a farm operator *Producer, a stakeholder of economic production * Film producer, supervises the making of films **Executive producer, contributes ...

1995 1995 was designated as: * United Nations Year for Tolerance * World Year of Peoples' Commemoration of the Victims of the Second World War This was the first year that the Internet was entirely privatized, with the United States government ...

for his contributions to the film ''

Toy Story ''Toy Story'' is a 1995 American animated adventure comedy film produced by Pixar Animation Studios for Walt Disney Pictures. It is the first installment in the Toy Story (franchise), ''Toy Story'' franchise and the Firsts in animation, firs ...

''.

Biography

He was born in

New Rochelle, New York New Rochelle ( ; in ) is a Political subdivisions of New York State#City, city in Westchester County, New York, Westchester County, New York (state), New York, United States. It is a suburb of New York City, located approximately from Midtow ...

to Hanneleis Feibelmann, a German-Jewish

Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

survivor, and Jules Guggenheim, a Swiss-born businessman. Guggenheim excelled in his studies at New Rochelle High School and earned admission to

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The institution was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools. In 1912, it became the Carnegie Institu ...

. At Carnegie Mellon University, Guggenheim became one of the first students in Dietrich college to self-define a major in film, and went on to create a documentary about the Robotics Institute in the School of Computer Science. Creating the documentary exposed him to the 3D research at the time and fostered his interest in continuing on in his Masters at CMU in the School of Computer Science. Guggenheim stayed in Pittsburgh and graduated in 1977 with a Masters in Computer Science. After his time at CMU, Ralph worked for the

New York Institute of Technology Computer Graphics Lab The Computer Graphics Lab is a computer lab located at the New York Institute of Technology (NYIT), founded by Alexander Schure. It was originally located at the "pink building" on the NYIT campus. It has played an important role in the history ...

. He was soon contacted by Lucasfilm and moved to California in 1980. During his time at Lucasfilm, Guggenheim developed EditDroid, which proved to be a revolutionary film-editing system. After his research lab at Lucasfilm was sold to

Steve Jobs Steven Paul Jobs (February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American businessman, inventor, and investor best known for co-founding the technology company Apple Inc. Jobs was also the founder of NeXT and chairman and majority shareholder o ...

and renamed Pixar, Guggenheim continued to work in the world of graphics and animation. Guggenheim, a respected founder of Pixar, eventually became Vice President of Feature Animation and co-produced ''

'' alongside Bonnie Arnold.Price, David A., "The Pixar Touch", Knopf, 2008, Guggenheim left the company in 1997 after Disney forced Pixar to remove him as producer from ''

Toy Story 2 ''Toy Story 2'' is a 1999 American animated adventure comedy film produced by Pixar Animation Studios, and the first sequel to Toy Story. It is the second installment in the Toy Story (franchise), ''Toy Story'' franchise and was directed by J ...

''. Since his time at Pixar, Guggenheim has worked as an executive at Electronic Arts. After his time at Electronic Arts, Guggenheim started Alligator Planet LLC with three other partners. Guggenheim is currently the CEO of Alligator Planet.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Guggenheim, Ralph 1951 births Film producers from New York (state) Carnegie Mellon University alumni Computer graphics professionals Electronic Arts employees Living people Lucasfilm people Artists from New Rochelle, New York New York Institute of Technology faculty Pixar people New Rochelle High School alumni