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resume: ollie rankin


OBJECTIVE:

To explore new technologies, techniques and media, to devise new ways to engage and entertain people.


EXPERIENCE:

CROWD TECHNICAL DIRECTOR, Moving Picture Company.
February 2004 - February 2005
  • Design and coding involvement in development of the second generation of the in-house crowd system, comprising a suite of MAYA plugins and custom interfaces.
  • Delivered crowd simulations for numerous shots in both Wolfgang Petersen's Troy, and Ridley Scott's Kingdom of Heaven.

    CROWD CONSULTANT / FX TECHNICAL DIRECTOR, ESC Entertainment.
    July - October 2003
  • Simulated/animated individual and swarming "sentinels" for pivotal battle sequence in The Matrix Revolutions using a custom MAYA-based solution.
  • Made code additions to the sentinel swarm pipeline to handle sentinels being shot and to facilitate dynamics-driven deaths.

    FREELANCE DIGITAL ARTIST, 31770.net Tokyo, Japan.
    February - June 2003
  • Ongoing personal art projects exploring human/computer interface and algorithmic multimedia.
  • Led small team at a Tokyo studio (EYEdentify Inc.) creating 3D fly-throughs of 400 year old wood block prints for a TV/HDTV documentary marking the anniversary of Tokyo becoming capital of Japan. Modelled, shaded, textured and animated in MAYA, rendered non-photorealistically in MAYA and BMRT, composited in Shake.
  • Produced original electronic music for the 2003 UKVisions Snowboarding video.

    MASSIVE TD, WETA Digital Ltd.
    (Winner: 2002 & 2003 Oscar & Bafta awards for Best Visual Effects, 8 Visual Effects Society Awards)
    October 1999 - October 2002
  • Pre-visualised, choreographed and animated crowd, flock and battle scenes for the first two Lord of the Rings films using a proprietary artificial intelligence-driven crowd animation package, MASSIVE.
  • Developed techniques, core modules, and complementary software during R&D and pre-production which were used throughout the production.


    EDUCATION:

    BACHELOR OF SCIENCE(HONS) - 1st Class Honours
    Department of Computer Science, University of Auckland, New Zealand.
    March 1995 - November 1998
    This was a four year postgraduate-level degree in Computer Science. Final year papers include: Advanced Graphics, Machine Learning, Advanced Algorithmics, Multimedia/Hypermedia Systems, OO Systems. I also completed a Graduate Project in Computer Science, investigating the use of Genetic Algorithms for evolving procedural game strategies.


    SKILLS:

    PLATFORMS - *nix, MacOS, Windows.
    SOFTWARE - Maya, Shake, Photoshop, Director, Flash, Pro Tools, Logic Audio, Reason...
    PROGRAMMING/SCRIPTING - C/C++, Java, Python, Perl, Tcl/Tk, Mel, LINGO, ActionScript...


    OTHER PURSUITS:

  • As part of my ongoing 31770.net projects, I produced, directed and performed in a multimedia installation performance series, called one of each, for the 2002 Wellington Fringe Festival.
  • My algorithmic audiovisual piece, baulk, screened at the 2002 Handle The Jandal NZ Music Video Awards.
  • I like to travel, snowboard, scuba dive, trek, and play team sports socially.


    • cover letter | resume | vfx showreel