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He initially worked as an animator at Disney in the late 70s before going on to join the computer animation division of Lucasfilm<\/a>‘s Industrial Light and Magic<\/a>.<\/p>\n In 1986 the department was purchased by Apple<\/a> founder Steve Jobs<\/a> who renamed the new company Pixar<\/a> (a fake Spanish word meaning ‘to make pixels’) and gave Lasseter the freedom to direct, produce and create models for a variety of projects, many of which were television commercials.<\/p>\n In the late 1980s Lasseter made several award winning shorts before going on to direct the groundbreaking Toy Story<\/a> in 1995, the first feature-length computer animated film.<\/p>\n As the chief of Pixar’s creative department, Lasseter became the key figure behind an extraordinary run of critically acclaimed, blockbuster animated films.<\/p>\n He directed A Bug’s Life<\/a> (1998), Toy Story 2<\/a> (1999) and Cars<\/a> (2006) whilst also serving as executive producer on Monsters, Inc.<\/a> (2001), Finding Nemo<\/a> (2003) and The Incredibles (2004), Ratatouille<\/a> (2007) and WALL-E<\/a> (2008).<\/p>\n If the success of Pixar was not enough, his career reached a new plateau in early 2006 when Disney officially acquired Pixar<\/a>, and promoted Lasseter to Chief Creative Officer of Walt Disney Feature Animation<\/a>.<\/p>\n The first movie he has overseen for Disney is Bolt<\/a><\/strong>, the tale of a small white dog who, having spent his entire life acting in a TV series, thinks that he has super powers.<\/p>\n Directed by Chris Williams<\/a> and Byron Howard<\/a>, it was produced by Lasseter and I spoke to him in London recently about his career and the new film.<\/p>\n You can listen to the interview here:<\/p>\n