jobs

	January 2007 to Present - Chief Technical Officer Balanced Worlds, Beijing China Christopher Pfeiffer and I are laying the foundation of our new game studio that will begin operations around June 2007 in Beijing, China. In preparation, I am planning the technical infrastructure, and moving to Beijing to start operations. The name “Balanced Worlds” symbolizes our core values. We strive to harmoniously balance eastern and western business practices, talent, and culture, to create games that carefully balance innovation and mass market appeal. We know that successful studios must have a strong dedication to work-life balance. Our goal is to establish a highly creative studio where we retain key employees by providing the best work environment in the industry. Chris and I have learned from some of the best people in the industry while working on AAA titles at exceptional game companies. In China, we will use this experience to produce content rich games that would be impossible to make anywhere else.
	Spring 2005 to January 2007 - Lead Programmer Insomniac Games, Burbank CA As a lead programmer at Insomniac I managed the seven member gameplay systems team for Resistance: Fall Of Man, a launch title for the Sony Playstation3. The team was responsible for developing our proprietary physics engine, the inverse kinematics system, the effects conduit, the HUD and UI, breakable objects, dynamic glass and simulated flexible hoses. I was involved in planning and scheduling the team's work, handling programmer reviews, managing sweeping code projects to get the game with its memory and performance budgets, and organizing technology transitions to keep pace with the Playstation3 launch. I introduced several improvements to the scheduling and goal tracking processes to encourage efficiency, fairness, accountability, and a sense of team morale. As a programmer I implemented several key gameplay systems including inverse kinematics for dynamic foot placement on uneven terrain and an enemy artificial intelligence. With the completion of Resistance, I transitioned onto a new game project at Insomniac as the lead of the gameplay programming team.
	Spring 2003 to Spring 2005 - Gameplay Programmer Insomniac Games, Burbank CA Insomniac Games is a game development studio located in Burbank, California. Insomniac has created some of the most memorable games for the Sony Playstation and Playstation 2, including the first 3 games in the Spyro the Dragon series for the Playstation, the Ratchet and Clank series for the Playstation2, and the upcoming Resistance: Fall Of Man for the Playstation3. My first job at Insomniac was working as a gameplay programmer on Ratchet and Clank: Going Commando, developing the enemy AI, game logic, and level specific special effects for one level and two arena challenges in the game. On Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal I worked on enemy AI and effects for the robot troopers and sewer dwelling aliens, as well as creating a dynamic whip simulation for the enemies in the arena. Next I began working on the pre-production team for Resistance: Fall Of Man, for the Playstation3. I developed several key gameplay systems and worked on some prototype next-generation technology such as the joint formulation for our proprietary physics engine, a deformable metal simulation, a ripping cloth simulation, a water surface simulation with cresting waves, and dynamic inverse kinematics for arms and legs of animating alien and humanoid characters.
	Summer 2002 - Programmer Angel Studios, Carlsbad CA Angel is a game company based in the Carlsbad area, north of San Diego. They develop games for the many platforms, including the Sony Playstation 2, Microsoft XBox and Nintendo GameCube. I started my internship at Angel by working in their R&D group, where I developed a demo for a novel large-scale battle game concept, using simulation level of detail, hierarchical unit control, and steering behaviors for high speed non-holonomic vehicles. Next I worked on the programming team for Spyhunter 2 for the Playstation 2, where I added visual levels of detail to a dynamic water simulation, and improved the water physics interaction.
	Fall 2000 to Winter 2002 - Research Assistant University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill As a research assistant for the Gamma research group at UNC, I have worked on several projects in the area of motion planning and physical simulation. I have worked on several project with my advisor Prof. Ming C. Lin, including: vPlan, a system for planning the motion of free flying rigid and articulated objects using a Voronoi graph computedwith graphics hardware cPlan, a Constraint Based Planning framework for interactive path planning and control of rigid and articulated objects in dynamic environments A novel path planning system that automatically computes collision free paths for a human avatar moving in a massive virtual environment
	Summer 2001 - Programmer Solworks, Carlsbad CA Solworks is a video game company based near San Diego, which specializes in games for the PlayStation 2. I spent 3 months there as a programming intern. During my time there I worked on the NHL FaceOff franchise of games. I developed a real time simulation for the cloth at the back of the hockey nets. To do this I implemented a paper published in the Game Developers Conference 2001 with several modifications and tweaks to integrate the system into the game and make it as fast as possible for our purposes. The simulation works in gameplay and in instant replay mode and only activates when the puck hits the net fabric. When active, the simulation takes less than 1/10th of a frame, with the game running at 30 frames per second. As my second project at Solworks, I redeveloped much of the Artificial Intelligence controlling hockey players in defensive roles. This involved creating a new method for tracking and intercepting opponents and also redesigning the state machine that coordinates an entire team's defense behavior.
	Fall 1998 to Spring 2000 - Teaching Assistant & Research Assistant York University, Toronto Canada While I was an undergraduate at York I worked as a teaching and research assistant in the Computer Science department and as a research assistant in the Mathematics department. As a research assistant for the computer science department I implemented a tracking system to allow multi-user interaction with a virtual environment using laser pointers. This involved programming video capture and processing using DirectX under Windows NT. In the mathematics department I worked on the application of projective geometry and Grassman algebra to the study of rigid structures in the 2D and 3D.
	Summer 1999 - Programmer Drastic Technologies, Etobicoke ON Canada Drastic Technologies develops high end digital video systems for broadcast applications. During my summer there I created an audio test signal generator to evaluate the quality of an audio set-up and was exposed to large scale projects and code reuse.
	Spring 1995 to Fall 1999 - Programmer and Web Site Manager Forefront Graphics Corporation, Toronto Canada I worked at Forefront Graphics for almost 5 years on a part time basis beginning in my last year of high school. My position began with maintaining the company's web site and price lists, but evolved to include programming useful administrative applications as my programming skills developed. Forefront gave me a great opportunity to work during the school year, by allowing very flexible hours so that I could concentrate on school.