Summary
For the past 20 years I’ve worn many hats at Ready At Dawn. Over the years I’ve been Art / Technical Art Director and Studio Art Director, Lead 3D Artist, and Environment Artist in title, but along the way I contributed personally in a Tech Art, Tools Programming, Lighting, 3D Matte Painting, and VFX capacity, and served as Game Director on Lone Echo 2.
With my background blending art, engineering, and design, I am grateful to have found a natural creative and professional home in the field of games and interactive entertainment. I feel the best products we can aspire to create weaves each of these seemingly disparate things into a singular voice, and these voices in harmony can result in some amazing creative and technological innovations, and create unique experiences that leave deep, lasting memories and a shared bond with players.
For the right fit I would absolutely be open to continuing in an AD capacity. But I think my personal excitement for the future may lie in shifting in a Tech Art Director or Tech Art / VFX role. I find it incredibly rewarding growing and caring for a talented team and helping guide the overall project and studio success, but there is just a certain pure joy I get as an artistic engineer. And through my diverse career experience I think I have a talent for cohesively blending together art, tech, and creative into a unique and cohesive whole, and architecting elegant and novel approaches to visual pipelines and content creation along the way.
While I sift through decades of work for more samples, you can catch some of my contributions in the links below. Some more conceptual / architectural guided, but many I personally created from the ground-up. I look forward to continuing to build innovative real-time production technology to create inspiring worlds and stories for players to venture forth into, leaving them with lasting memories that stick with them, long after they are finished.
-Nathan
Tech & Art from The Order: 1886
+ Behind-the-scenes visual tech & pipelines: https://vimeo.com/showcase/11311157
+ You can download the SIGGRAPH Production Talks linked in the ‘Publications’ section below for more in-depth pipeline overviews.
Misc Tech Art
+ Samples from the Lone Echo / Echo VR series and other projects:
https://vimeo.com/showcase/11313101
Not currently shown
+ Over my first decade at RAD I architected, wrote, and maintained our entire tools pipeline in Maya, all while contributing as an Environment Artist, then 3D Art Lead, and then Art Director. More details listed in my work experience below.
Skills
Software proficiency
Productions
- Video GameEcho VR
- Year2018
- RoleArt Director
- CompanyReady At Dawn
- Video GameLone Echo II
- Year2021
- RoleGame Director
- CompanyReady At Dawn
- Video GameLone Echo
- Year2017
- RoleArt Director
- CompanyReady At Dawn Studios
- Video GameThe Order: 1886
- Year2015
- RoleArt Director
- CompanyReady at Dawn Studios
- Video GameGod of War: Ghost of Sparta
- Year2010
- RoleArt Director
- CompanyReady at Dawn Studios
- Video GameGod of War: Chains of Olympus
- Year2008
- RoleLead 3D Artist
- CompanyReady at Dawn Studios
- Video GameDaxter
- Year2006
- RoleEnvironment Artist
- CompanyReady at Dawn Studios
Experience
- Art Director at Ready at Dawn StudiosIrvine, United States of AmericaJanuary 2009 - Present
Lone Echo / Echo Arena:
+ Responsible for visual direction of project and supervised art production
+ Directly managed props pipeline and art outsourcing
+ Production UI design for in-world screens, interacts, and player systems
+ Additional FX and material support for planetary vistas and atmosphericsThe Order 1886:
+ Responsible for visual direction of project and supervised art production
+ Worked with art and engineering teams to propose and develop various pipeline solutions
(including: material and compositing system, textile scanning, cinematic shot lighting, character art pipelines and costume detailing, prop baking and lod generation, color grading, and fullscreen fx)
+ Production lighting artist for both environment and cinematic shot lighting
+ Further extension of maya data driven node editor developed on previous engineGod of War: Ghost of Sparta:
+ Responsible for visual direction of project and supervised art production
+ Created bulk of environmental FX and skydome backdrops
+ Additional environmental modeling, texturing, game lighting, and cinematic finishing
+ Additional tools development to expand upon Chains of Olympus technology - Lead 3D Artist at Ready at Dawn StudiosIrvine, United States of AmericaJune 2006 - December 2008
God of War: Chains of Olympus:
+ Worked with artists to establish and maintain art style, including modeling, texturing, lighting, UI, and FX.
+ Served as bridge between artists and programmers to optimize production pipelines, prioritize and implement new tech requests, and develop solutions for performance optimization.
+ Closely supported lighting artist with art direction and rough production color keys.
+ Created most environmental FX (Texture/Geo/Particles) and skydome compositions.
+ Additional environmental modeling, character and combat FX, game lighting, and cinematic finishing.
+ Designed and programmed user side of the Ready at Dawn Engine Maya tools architecture, driven entirely by markup language. - Environment Artist at Ready at Dawn StudiosIrvineAugust 2004 - June 2006
Daxter:
+ Modeled, textured, and lit environments for Daxter (PSP).
+ Additional concept art, graphic design, and tools scripting. - Designer / 3D Illustrator at AlienintheBoxSan Francisco, United States of AmericaJanuary 1999 - July 2004
Conceptual illustration, branding, web, and graphic design for various clients in the aerospace and technology industries
- Graphic Artist at Engineered MultimediaAtlanta, United States of AmericaDecember 1998 - December 1999