Loren Carpenter

Who is Loren Carpenter?

Loren C. Carpenter is a computer graphics researcher and developer. He is co-founder and chief scientist of Pixar Animation Studios. He is the co-inventor of the Reyes rendering algorithm and is one of the authors of the PhotoRealistic RenderMan software which implements Reyes and which renders all of Pixar's movies. Following Disney's acquisition of Pixar, Carpenter became a Senior Research Scientist at Disney Research.

In around 1967 Carpenter began work at Boeing Computer Services in Seattle, Washington. During his time there Carpenter studied for a B.S. in Mathematics and an M.S. in Computer Science, both from the University of Washington. Some of his work concerned using computer technology to improve Boeing's mechanical design processes, which were still entirely done by hand on paper.

In 1980 he gave a presentation at the SIGGRAPH conference, in which he showed "Vol Libre", a 2 minute computer generated movie. This showcased his software for generating and rendering fractally generated landscapes, and was met with a standing ovation, and he was immediately invited to work at Lucasfilm's Computer Division. There Carpenter worked on the "genesis effect" scene of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, which featured an entire fractally-landscaped planet.