Pauline Koh

Work History

• 

  Senior Cloud Ops

  Technicolor

  April 2016 - Present
• 

  Global Render TD Group Lead

  MPC

  May 2015 - January 2016

  Build and lead a global Render TD group.
  
  The Render TD group works to create better awareness and accountability of recurring, inefficient usage patterns and recommend best practice for render resources users and stakeholders.
  
  Lead the Render TD group to achieve its working goals by focusing on three areas of service:
  ● Render Issues Triage for multiple creative departments covering global locations
  -○ Best practices curation; consultation
  --+ cross-site [London, Vancouver, Montreal, Bangalore]
  --+ cross-dept [inc: Lighting, Techanim, Lookdev, FX]
  --+ cross-show (including consultation for non-show groups inc: prodops, software dev, core eng, rendering pipe)
  
  ● Systematic benchmark testing and profiling; prototyping of new elements in the render operations.
  -○ Recently this includes design and strategy for:
  --+ custom renderman stats stylesheets;
  --+ "Software Defined Data Center" rendering [usage, testing, prod deploy strategy].
  
  ● Analysis and reporting of contextualised, digested data from triage, testing, and metrics for rendering stakeholders. Flag potential show blockers and scaling issues early.
  -○ Most recently been prototyping:
  --+ design and precision of new render activity graphs from limited metrics.
  --+ design and validation of new resources management strategies [close collab with film sups and HoDs]
  
  Ideal outcomes:
  ● Artists get to concentrate on artsing: more consistent technical support for new or untested areas of pipe
  ● USAGE/USER POV Documentation improved and up to date; not just API/DEV docs.
  ● Software Devs get clean, triaged repros and better usage feedback
  ● Production and Operations are better aware of render resources usage and blockers; kept up to speed on best practices
  ● Overall reduction in 'firefighting' and 'context switching(to support)' from Render issues.
• 

  Lead, Render TD; Lighting Department

  MPC

  October 2014 - January 2016

  * cross-show render optimisation support for Lighting Department, MPC London
  * cross-show render pipeline analysis for Lighting Department stakeholders, MPC London
  * cross-show render TD team leadership.
• 

  Lighting TD

  MPC

  April 2014 - October 2014

  ● Render TD support for Lighting at MPC London.
  
  ● Analyst; render configuration optimisation.
  
  ● Shaman
• 

  Digital Artist, Lighting Technical Director (TD)

  Animal Logic

  March 2013 - November 2013

  ● Animated feature film project lighting department rendering pipeline technical support
  
  ● In addition to continuation of duties from previous project; now applied to Animated Feature project within the context of a team of TDs:
  
  ○ Basic Pymel and Python syntax pipeline scripts maintenance
  
  ○ Liaison between the Lighting department and rendering resource support
  
  ○ Monitoring and reporting of the health of Lighting render jobs
  
  ○ Leveraging render wrangling experience to bring a render resource management perspective to the technical direction team.
  
  ○ Help to triage new render technology being integrated into pipeline
• 

  Digital Artist, Lighting Technical Director (TD)

  Animal Logic

  July 2012 - March 2013

  ● Feature film project lighting department rendering pipeline technical support
  
  ○ Analysis of rendering strategy efficacy
  
  ○ Basic Pymel and Python syntax pipeline scripts maintenance
  
  ○ Artists’ first point of contact for assistance in troubleshooting problematic renders; apply fixes at scene or submission
  
  ○ Analysis of rendering issues to isolate endemic problems
  
  ○ Mentoring Lighting Team members on rendering, scene optimization, Farm reports and render logs
• 

  Lead Render Wrangler

  Dr. D Studios

  August 2010 - February 2011

  Management and planning for render wrangling team at Dr. D studios.
  
  Plan and provide leadership for:
  Hiring of render wranglers
  hours and rostering
  documentation of render farm and render scheduler for wranglers and internal clients
  contingency planning and development coordination for renderops
  Liase and report to production stakeholders to inform their decisions process
  Scheduling, coordinating, and analysis of Farm Stress Testing.
  Establishment and population of Render issues knowledgebase.
  
  In addition to basic Render Wrangler Duties:
  manage and optimise render resources allocation
  implement production requirements for resources allocation
  triage of render issues
  render resources advisor to artist leads and artist teams
• 

  Render Technical Director (TD)

  Animal Logic

  April 2010 - August 2010

  My move into the Render TD position at Animal Logic allows me to leverage my experience with the Render Resources facilities to help the Lighting/FX TD team isolate more struggling renders, and pre-empt more render issues.
  
  
  ** Animation feature film project lighting & effects rendering technical support
  
  o Liaison between the Lighting/FX department and rendering resource support
  
  o Artists’ first point of contact for assistance in troubleshooting problematic renders; apply fixes at scene or submission
  
  o Monitoring and reporting of the health of Lighting/FX render jobs
  
  o Analysis of rendering issues to isolate endemic problems
  
  o Mentoring Lighting Team members on rendering, scene optimization, proprietary pipeline tools, Farm reports and render logs
  
  o Leveraging render wrangling experience to bring a render resource management perspective to the technical direction team.
  
  o ‘Pixar Renderman’ renderer pipeline; operation, troubleshooting, stats analysis
• 

  Render Wrangler

  Animal Logic

  June 2009 - May 2010

  Fault diagnosis and resolution of 3D render jobs interacting with a render farm comprised of systems varying in terms of hardware specifications, and operating systems. Work with custom written resource management and monitoring software and assist in testing and feedback of evolving systems. Monitor and triage issues arising from complex interactivity between licenses, OS, software, hardware, networked storage solutions and user submission parameters.
  
  Point Summary:
  ** Rendering resource and process management on Australia’s largest render farm **
  
  
  o Ensure efficient use of rendering resources, maximising throughput while minimising rendering delays
  
  o Equitable resource allocation based on each production’s operational needs
  
  o Communicate effectively with internal departments and stakeholders
  
  o Prioritise requests across competing deadlines
  
  o Multitask and constantly monitor queuing system
  
  o Identify, report and resolve problems with the rendering process
  
  o Analyse trends to pre-empt render issues and identify best practices
  
  o Development and testing of internal Python/bash scripts and tools; operate across multiple operating sysems and environments.
  
  **[as of Nov 2009: http://www.top500.org/list/2009/11/500]
  
  Environments:
  Linux, Windows, some OSX; 32 and 64bit.
  
  Important skills:
  Communication
  Filesystem navigation and basic systems familiarity
  Proactive approach to updating working knowledge
  Versatility and flexibility to accommodate production requirements

  
• 

  Tech Frontline

  Rising Sun Pictures

  September 2008 - June 2009

  First point of contact for technical issues, fielding support requests across two office locations. Highly customer oriented approach with an emphasis on short "Time to first response" metrics.
  
  Dealt with a wide variety of issues including hardware, software, user management and administration. Communication skills were constantly exercised. I also had to be able to identify patterns or problems which pointed to systems failures and alert higher level sysadmins.

• IT Services Support Clerk

  University of New South Wales

  June 2006 - September 2008