Experience

SANZARU

• United States
• Computer Games
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Senior Graphics Engineer

  • Mar 2022 - Present

• Core Technology Engineer

  • Aug 2015 - Mar 2022

  As a leading member of the Core Technology group, contributed substantial new features to custom version of the Unreal engine that have been used across multiple projects, including integrating third-party solutions, when available. Determined which project-specific changes were worthy of maintaining in the shared code trunk, integrated new major versions of Unreal, and in general enforced engine code quality in a team of ~20 engineers. Fielded numerous feature requests directly from artists, for both visual effects and workflow improvements. Employed both high- and low-level optimizations across consoles and PC. Responsible for fixing technically difficult or hard-to-reproduce bugs.Internal tools: 8/2015 - Now• Scripted automatic Unreal version update merger for Perforce, halving average upgrade time• Mentored core tech team members working on Maya and Unreal plugins for artist use• Supported distributed light bakes, Simplygon LoD generation, and continuous integration servicesAsgard’s Wrath: 6/2016 - Now• Integrated NVIDIA WaveWorks and Flex libraries for realistic ocean and blood physics & rendering• Extended precomputed visibility, texture atlassing, and UI rendering systems per artist requestsMarvel Powers United: 11/2016 - 7/2018• Developed motion sickness mitigation post-process, also used in Asgard’s Wrath• Supported NeoFur plugin, optimized physics and rendering, added X-Ray postprocessFacebook Spaces: 6/2016 - 4/2017• Refined hand-held stereo portal rendering, immersive “photo sphere” rendering in Unity VR Sports Challenge 8/2015 - 12/2016• Implemented efficient stadium crowd rendering with thousands of units, also used in Ripcoil• Helped port pared-down experience to mobile Gear VR platformRipcoil: 8/2015 - 12/2016• Spearheaded gameplay prototyping for 2-player online Oculus Touch launch titleTron RUN/r - 7/2015 - 5/2016• Handled audio/text localization, leaderboards, and rendering features / optimization Show less

• Game Engineer

  • Aug 2013 - Aug 2015

  Shipped Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice on the Nintendo 3DS, doing both gameplay and rendering work. The boss battles were especially challenging, because they involved gameplay seamlessly split between the upper and lower screens, which had different resolutions and physical sizes. Compared to the usual UI elements present on the lower touch screen, fully animated characters were expensive to render an additional time, and so required custom culling to hit framerate.• Implemented multiple boss battles, coding both gameplay and cinematic scripts• Added auto-generated, sparse, spherical harmonic-based indirect lighting probe system to capture color bleeding• Exposed functionality through XML-based tools to designers and artists for rapid iteration• Designed and wrote shaders in GPU assembly for titular fire & ice effects, including procedural animation and refraction• Optimized rendering in proprietary engine at all pipeline stages with little or no sacrifice in quality; reduced mesh sizes by 30% on average, saved 8ms on full-screen boss render timeShipped Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal for the Nintendo 3DS as a gameplay engineer, handling end-to-end feature creation, from the Maya and XML-based tools through to the game-side realization in Sanzaru's proprietary, cross-platform C++ engine.• Worked with designers and animators to create all 15 basic enemies, handling AI, projectiles, etc.• Implemented the enerbeam swing mechanic, which smoothly moves the player from any starting position to a designer-controlled ending position and velocity in a believable arc.• Coded both the default and combat camera behaviors.• Created the targeting system for using the enerbeam and homing attacks.• Primary owner of the volume trigger system, which was used for everything from causing player damage on hazards to activating music and camera changes.• Implemented character shadows. Show less



ObjectVideo

• United States
• Software Development
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Software Engineer

  • Jan 2011 - Jan 2013

  Developed and optimized multiple-camera human tracking project: • Implemented synthetic pose generation using Maya API (C++, Python & Mel), MoCap sequences in multiple formats, and dual quaternion skinning. Also responsible for synthetic mesh rigging, anthropometry, and PCA decomposition. • Migrated tracking components to GPU using OpenGL and Cg, for over 3x speedup. • Scripted Levenberg-Marquardt-based skeletal IK optimization, implemented voxel-based 3D reconstruction Designed, implemented, and maintained large-scale real-time aerial tracking software: • Created efficient, client-friendly media processing API using compile-time C/C++ algorithms • Divided processing algorithms into GPU- and CPU-based data-parallel implementations using CUDA and OpenMP • Optimized system for multiple use cases, including multiple tracking windows, Gigapixel-sized full frames, and porting to FPGA hardware platform. Modified Virtual Video multi-camera simulation software (C++ Half-Life 2 Mod) to generate aerial footage: • Implemented pan/zoom support, as well as partial frustum rendering for subimages. • Created C# client program to send commands and receive frames over socket, interfacing with existing large DARPA-funded tracking project • Expanded Lua scripting support and simplified API. • Created maps and scripted scenarios, including traffic simulation, vehicle tracking, and passenger entry/exits with ground truth location annotations and image masks. Show less



George Mason University

• United States
• Higher Education
• 700 & Above Employee

• CS Undergraduate Teaching Assistant

  • Sep 2009 - Dec 2010

  • Answered student questions and graded homework concerning C, C++, IA32 Assembly, game development, and general systems-level program operation. • Delivered two hour-long lectures on (a) integrating Lua scripting into Ogre Rendering Engine, and (b) the function and application of fragment shaders in the graphics pipeline. • Responsible for over 260 students over 3 semesters. • Served as one of 8 nominated students on CS Undergraduate Advisory Board to make department curriculum and management recommendations. Show less



ObjectVideo

• United States
• Software Development
• 1 - 100 Employee

• R&D Intern

  • May 2010 - Aug 2010

  • Assisted integration of Virtual Video multi-camera simulation software (a Half-Life 2 Mod) into DARPA-funded ARGUS aerial surveillance project. • Worked in C++ and Lua in Valve's Source engine, and C# in ARGUS codebase. • Assisted integration of Virtual Video multi-camera simulation software (a Half-Life 2 Mod) into DARPA-funded ARGUS aerial surveillance project. • Worked in C++ and Lua in Valve's Source engine, and C# in ARGUS codebase.



Drexel University

• United States
• Higher Education
• 700 & Above Employee

• Robotics & Computer Vision Research/Lab Assistant

  • May 2008 - Dec 2008

  • Designed, constructed, programmed, and deployed IR camera simultaneous tracking of multiple nocturnal beetles using C/C++, Intel OpenCV library, and Matlab • Administered and assisted with student labs in introductory robotics course, culminating in autonomous color tracking using Kalman Filters • Designed, constructed, programmed, and deployed IR camera simultaneous tracking of multiple nocturnal beetles using C/C++, Intel OpenCV library, and Matlab • Administered and assisted with student labs in introductory robotics course, culminating in autonomous color tracking using Kalman Filters



C.T. Stellwag & Asscoiates, Inc.

• Construction Management Intern

  • Jun 2007 - Aug 2007

  • Maintained Windows .NET 2000 Server and office network • Supported e-mail, PDA, FTP, and notebook wireless services • Participated in $500,000 Corporate Renovation Project • Assisted managing the painting, repair, and refurbishing of 15 Big O Tires stores in the Las Vegas area over 2 weeks • Personally oversaw six-person work crew • Coordinated subcontractors, equipment rental companies, and store managers • Documented renovation process • Maintained Windows .NET 2000 Server and office network • Supported e-mail, PDA, FTP, and notebook wireless services • Participated in $500,000 Corporate Renovation Project • Assisted managing the painting, repair, and refurbishing of 15 Big O Tires stores in the Las Vegas area over 2 weeks • Personally oversaw six-person work crew • Coordinated subcontractors, equipment rental companies, and store managers • Documented renovation process