CSI East Bay-Oakland has monthly chapter meetings every third Tuesday of the month at Scott’s Seafood in Oakland, CA. Generally, we have a guest speaker to present on various topics for our members and guests (members of the public welcome). For November’s chapter meeting, we were very lucky to have Tia Kratter of Pixar Studios as our guest presenter:
Tia joined Pixar Animation Studios in 1993 as a Digital Painter during production of the studio’s first feature film, Toy Story. She has subsequently held the Shader Art Director role on five other films, including Pixar’s Monster’s Inc., A Bugs Life, Brave, and others. As a Shader Art Director at Pixar, Tia was responsible for specifying the color and texture of every object modeled for a film.
Currently, as the Manager of Art & Film at Pixar University, the educational branch of Pixar, Tia helps to foster the continuing education of Pixar employees; teaching art classes and offering writing, film, and a wide variety of related classes to its 1300 employees.
Prior to Pixar, Tia was a background painter at Disney Feature Animation from 1980 to 1994, where she worked on a variety of acclaimed animated films including The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, and Beauty and the Beast, Tron, and others.
Here is what CSI East Bay Oakland Chapter President Dan Galvez had to say about Tia’s presentation:
I have to say, I was blown away by our presentation last night by Tia Kratter, an artist with Pixar. She did a great job entertaining us, showing and describing what the offices and environment is like at Pixar, how important the culture and artistic freedom is to them and how they go about making their movies (it is a lot of work). She also gave away valuable gifts and did a great job of answering all our questions. Thanks Tia!
We had over 60 people attend the meeting last night, thanks to all who came and special thanks to our Laney College and Diablo Valley College architecture students and to our chapter members and friends who brought family members with them. Tia also brought her Dad!
- Tia Kratter of Pixar Studios during her presentation to CSI East Bay-Oakland Chapter.
- Tia Kratter of Pixar Studios during her presentation to CSI East Bay-Oakland Chapter.
- Tia Kratter of Pixar Studios during her presentation to CSI East Bay-Oakland Chapter.
- Tia Kratter of Pixar Studios during her presentation to CSI East Bay-Oakland Chapter.
- Tia Kratter of Pixar Studios during her presentation to CSI East Bay-Oakland Chapter.
- Tia Kratter of Pixar Studios during her presentation to CSI East Bay-Oakland Chapter.
Tabletops
We were very pleased to have Diane Buckley, who represents Signature Reprographics. We were very impressed with the variety of products they had and their flexibility in accommodating the customer and market needs. They’ve been around awhile and have morphed with the changes in blueprint production.

Diane Buckley of Signature Reprographics shows some of the amazing graphics Signature is capable of producing
Please check out their website and Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/Signature-Reprographics-104291162970640/
Local Colleges Well Represented
It was great to see local students in attendance at Tia’s presentation! It was so nice to meet Mary, Pauline, and Riley of Diablo Valley College’s A.C.E. (Architecture, Construction, & Engineering Club). From Laney College, it was great to meet the President of the Laney Architecture Club, Dev Chand, and the other members of the club. Thank you so much to all the students for attending!

Pauline, Mary, and Riley from the Diablo Valley College A.C.E. (Architecture, Construction, and Engineering Club) with CSI East Bay-Oakland Chapter President Dan Galvez

Members of the Laney College Architecture Club with CSI East Bay-Oakland Chapter President Dan Galvez
For more information on DVC’s A.C.E:
https://www.dvc.edu/academics/psed/archi-engin/
And for more information on Laney College’s Architecture Club:
To see the entire photo album from the evening:
And as always, please give CSI East Bay-Oakland a follow on Social Media:
Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram !