Since May 2012 I worked for Weta Digital on various shows including "The Hobbit - The Desolation of Smaug", "The Hobbit - The Battle of the Five Armies", "Iron Man 3", "Fast and Furious 7" and "Maze Runner 2 - Scorch Trials", "Alvin and the Chipmunks - Road Chip", "The BFG", "Valerian and the city of a thousand Planets" and "Justice League". My role progressed from a Shots Assistant Lighting Technical Director to Lighting Technical Director. This involved providing technical support to the Lighting Department, testing, debugging and lighting shots with light rigs and from scratch, rendering all the needed passes as well as assisting with look development.
I also trained with the Matte Painting Department Team at Weta for two months. This meant advancing and growing my knowledge of software like Photoshop and Nuke as well as Matte painting methods and workflows which I have been able to integrate into my work as Lighting TD.
Wanting to grow my knowledge and skills of software and pipelines in a new environment, I decided to move to Vancouver Canada in late 2017.
There I started working as a Lighting TD at DNEG and greatly enjoyed working on "Deadpool 2", adapted to using Clarisse, working with a whole new fantastic team and upskilling.
After 9 months with DNEG I moved on to working with Image Engine on various shows including “Detective Pikachu”, “Carnival Row”, “Kingdom Hearts”, “The Mandalorian” Season 1 and 2 as well as the movie “Bloodshot” involving meticulous digi double face replacement.
I’ve loved working at IE for over two years now and have greatly increased my knowledge again, taking on a lot more responsibility in general.
I learned a whole new pipeline, using “Gaffer”, improving my Python scripting, lighting full sequences and sometimes being the sole Lighter on sequences and some shows, which lead to being promoted to Senior Lighting TD.
Working closely with many of the other departments, especially the Compositing team, has given me great understanding of the work flow within the pipe line, the huge importance of communication and an eye for detail.
Wanting to further broaden my knowledge in the field of Lighting, I decided to work for Sony Imageworks on “Hotel Transylvania 4” for 6 months, the first time I've worked on a full Animation Feature. While adapting to Sony’s Katana, I had to change my view on lighting from physically accurate to a more general mood and feel creative approach. Matching to colour keys or concept art at most has been a wonderful experience and has really let me engage my creative eye.
I also learnt how to composite my own shots, bringing shots all the way from setting up Rigs for colour keys of entire sequence of 30+ shots, to finishing and QC’ing them. I feel it has helped me to have even more well rounded skills as a Lighter.
Before coming to Weta Digital I worked as a Freelance VFX Generalist with a focus on animation for a year and a half with several Production houses in Auckland, NZ after graduating from Media Design School with an Industry Panel Award for "Highly Commended in Team Production" as well as winning the "Best Animation" award at the Hamburg Animation awards 2011 for our short film "First Contact". I received a Graduate Diploma in Advanced 3D Productions.
Prior to this I studied Fine Arts for two years at Whitecliffe College of Art and Design, graduating with Diploma of Art and Design.
I am thriving in my current environment, surrounded by highly intelligent, driven, creative and kind people. Pushing each other to be better at what we do, continually learning new methods and software, delivering excellent work on time and growing in the process.
I continue to pursue my creative interests outside of work painting, hiking, snowboarding, cooking and illustrating.