Pixar has announced the twelfth RenderMan Art Challenge, titled “First Contact.” The competition runs from 13 August to 10 November 2025 and focuses on shading, lighting, rendering, and compositing with Pixar’s renderer. The theme is aliens. Pixar ties this to two anniversaries: the release of Elio in 2025, where a boy is mistaken for Earth’s ambassador to outer space, and the 30th anniversary of Toy Story.
Participants are provided with 3D assets from Adobe, KitBash3D, Greyscalegorilla, Ozone3D, and Pixar. Submissions must be rendered using the official RenderMan plugins for Maya, Houdini, Katana, or Blender.
Rules of engagement
Each artist may submit one entry only, created individually. Works in progress must be posted to prove originality. The supplied assets form the backbone of the scene, but participants may add supporting geometry if it aids storytelling. Final images must meet these conditions:
- Resolution: up to 3840 x 2160 pixels
- Aspect ratio: 16:9
- Render engine: RenderMan only
- Compositing allowed: colour correction, grading, AOVs [Arbitrary Output Variables], LPEs [Light Path Expressions], and background replacement with owned/licensed material
- No paint-overs, photo-bashing, or third-party renderers are permitted.
Extraterrestrial feedback loop
Unlike many competitions, the RenderMan Art Challenge is structured as an open mentorship exercise. Pixar’s RenderMan team moderates the forums, answers technical questions, and provides critiques while the challenge runs.
Participants are encouraged to share works in progress. This creates a feedback loop where knowledge spreads across the community. Past challenges have shown that this process often produces detailed documentation of workflows, shading networks, and lighting techniques—resources that remain accessible after the contest ends. Semi-finalists will be asked to submit their project files to verify compliance with rules before judging.
Jury on the mothership
The 2025 jury includes senior professionals from Pixar and the wider VFX and animation industry. According to Pixar’s announcement and AWN’s coverage, jurors will include:
- Markus Kranzler, Global Technology Supervisor at Pixar
- Hannah Chan, Shading Technical Director at Pixar
- Tomer Meltser, Global Head of Education, NVIDIA
- Ahmed Gharraph, Head of Visualisation at Framestore
- Tom Reed, Senior Principal Engineer at Dell
- François Le Gall, Senior Look Development TD at Animal Logic
This mix of production TDs, hardware engineers, and educators suggests the judging will focus equally on artistic quality and technical accuracy.
Prizes orbiting the winners
The prize pool is made possible by a broad list of sponsors. The highlight is a Dell Precision Pro Max 16 mobile workstation with NVIDIA GPU.
Other prizes include:
- Software licences from Adobe, Foundry, Greyscalegorilla, KitBash3D, SideFX, SpeedTree, and fxphd
- Render credits from Ranch Computing
- Hardware tools from AMD, NVIDIA, Xencelabs, and Dell
Winners will be announced on 17 November 2025. According to Pixar’s rules, prizes are non-transferable and have no cash equivalent.
Conditions and eligibility
The contest is open to all registered members of the RenderMan community, regardless of whether they use commercial or non-commercial licences. Restrictions apply under US export control laws: entrants from Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria, and sanctioned Ukrainian territories are excluded.
Each entrant must respect asset copyright conditions. When publishing challenge images outside the contest forum, the following credit line is required: Assets by Adobe, KitBash3D, Greyscalegorilla, Ozone, and Pixar. RenderMan “First Contact” Art Challenge © Disney/Pixar.
Why these challenges matter
Since 2014, Pixar’s RenderMan Art Challenges have provided a public platform to test shading, rendering, and compositing skills in a production-like setting. Unlike vendor showcases, the contests rely on open participation and require all artists to use the same set of assets.
The format highlights what RenderMan can and cannot do in real-world workflows. Past challenges, such as “Shipshape” (2023) and “NASA Exploration” (2022), remain visible as galleries of tested techniques. For studios, this generates a form of community-driven benchmarking. For artists, it offers an opportunity to receive direct critique from Pixar staff and industry veterans.
