Sacramento-born Pixar animator to discuss graphic novel at Capital Books
Bobby Podesta ran rapidly through the list of films he’d worked on since first joining Pixar in 1997, listing hits like “The Incredibles,” “Toy Story 3” and “Cars” and many other titles that would likely be familiar to filmgoers.
“It’s like a lot of people’s childhood,” Podesta said.
Pixar isn’t everything about Podesta, though. Podesta, 50, lives in Oakland, but grew up in Sacramento, graduating from Christian Brothers High School in 1993.
As a teenager, Podesta’s first paid illustration gig was a comic strip for Sidetracks, a former youth-oriented section of The Sacramento Bee. And on Oct. 15 at Capital Books, Podesta will discuss “North for the Winter,” his graphic novel published Sept. 2 through First Second, an imprint of MacMillan Publishers.
How this book came to be
Traditionally, Pixar has encouraged its personnel to have side projects, according to Podesta’s friend Scott Morse. Podesta and Morse were roommates at California Institute of the Arts, or CalArts near Los Angeles. They later worked together for many years at Pixar before Morse was laid off in 2024.
Morse said he’s done graphic novels the entirety of his animation career, with work for Marvel, DC and books he self-published. He was delayed in being available for an interview for this story because, he said, he had been creating puppets for a production of “Little Shop of Horrors” at Bishop O’Dowd High School in Oakland.
Morse remembered advice he’d gotten from one of the legends he’d trained under, longtime Warner Bros. animator Maurice Noble. “Maurice pulled me aside when I was 20 and said, ‘Have something of your own. You can’t just do something for the studio. You have to have something of your own to be a real artist, to be a real storyteller,’” Morse said.
“North for the Winter” is aimed at middle-grade readers and about two children trying to help return a reindeer to Santa. It culminates with a mention of the then-Continental Air Defense Command, a precursor to NORAD, which began a program tracking Santa Claus in 1955.
Podesta’s book came together through a process that spanned more than a decade.
“It’s my first book because books take a long time and they take even longer… when you’ve got kids and a spouse and (a) full-time job and everything,” Podesta said.
Podesta first worked for Pixar from 1997 to 2011, according to his LinkedIn profile. He rejoined the company in 2014 and now serves as an animator, supervising animator and streaming director.
He had the initial idea for his book while driving to work over the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge on a foggy morning. Daydreaming, Podesta began wondering about what it would be like if a reindeer suddenly jumped into the road and then took off into the sky flying.
This kind of epiphany would be familiar to Podesta’s wife of 25 years, Lesley Podesta, who shares two now-college-aged children with him. She said her husband is devoted to creative work. “He just absolutely loves making things and he has ideas in his head all the time and he draws constantly,” Lesley Podesta said.
Morse noted that his friend is a hopeful person, saying, “He leads with a bright outlook on the world.”
Having never written a book, Bobby Podesta signed up for a writing class 10 years ago through the UC Berkeley Extension. A systematic person, he slowly began writing his book, according to Lesley Podesta. “He’d get up around 5, 5:30 and go downstairs and work for an hour until the kids woke up and then start his day and then go off to work,” she said.
Writing a graphic novel isn’t a quick process, said Bobby Podesta’s agent Jennifer March Soloway of the Andrea Brown Literary Agency. Soloway recalled a conversation she’d had with her client’s editor at First Second, Calista Brill.
“She told me that even the most seasoned, professional graphic novelists, they will take at least 18 months to two years to produce the art for a book and it’s because it’s just so labor intensive,” Soloway said.
While Bobby Podesta was creating his book, his work at Pixar continued. He said he worked on six Pixar films and one web series for the company while his book was in-progress: “Finding Dory,” “Toy Story 4,” “Onward” and “Inside/Out 2” which he helped animate; “Cars 3” and “Soul” where he supervised animation; and “Cars on the Road,” a web series for Disney+ that he helped direct.
Bobby Podesta finished his book around the beginning of this year, saying it was just before he did late-stage animation work on Pixar’s latest film to open in theaters, “Elio.”
Returning to Sacramento
Born in Sacramento, Bobby Podesta grew up in the Parkway neighborhood in the southern part of the city before he headed to CalArts. He and his wife met at Christian Brothers, around the time he was doing his comic strip for The Bee in the early ‘90s.
He has found time to get back to Sacramento, such as in the late 2010s when he did an art show at his high school friend Ross Hammond’s studio, Gold Lion Arts. The show displayed drawings Bobby Podesta had done in 2016 that wound up helping form his book.
Bobby Podesta said that the event at Capital Books will include a Q&A session and book signing.
Morse tries to stress to people that his career is as a storyteller, with jobs at places like Pixar just part of the equation. He said Bobby Podesta’s new book is just as important as his work at Pixar, as it’s one more stepping stone for his career.
“It’s a career that you never retire from and he’s never going to retire from it,” Morse said. “He’s going to be a storyteller until his last breath.”
If you go…
What: Bobby Podesta discussing his graphic novel “North for the Winter”
Where: Capital Books at 1011 K St. in Sacramento
When: Oct. 15, 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.
Cost: Free
Tickets: http://bit.ly/48qn2do
This story was originally published October 12, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
