Ross Kakuschke

Work History

• 

  Senior Programmer

  Relic Entertainment

  August 2014 - September 2015

  Local Maya Master...

• Software Design Engineer 2

  BigPark (Microsoft Game Studios) through Aquent

  November 2013 - August 2014

  Coding on xbox360 and xbox one

• Gameplay/Animation Programmer

  Switchblade Monkeys

  June 2012 - November 2013

  Doing game play and animation programming.
  
  http://secretponchos.com/
• 

  Pipeline Developer

  Image Engine

  August 2010 - April 2012

  Pipeline Developer for Image Engine
  Managed daily video production, configuring formats and codecs with ffmpeg, slate and plate overlay creation, colourspace conversions, nuke scriptlets
  Shotgun support and programming for process automation and integration of IE tools into Shotgun.
  Managed and supported Baselight and Filmlight theatre servers and data management.
  Managed central versioned software installations, both open source and commercial software

• Founder / Technical Director

  Lotusland Studios Inc.

  April 2009 - August 2010

  Had my fun with the interactive lighting scene and stage lighting control. I'm back in the video games. "I tried to get out, but they pulled me back in".
  
  Started my own company. Lotusland Studios Inc. Yep. A corporation. Kakow.
  
  Our first game is almost out, Hive for the iPhone and iPod Touch. It's looking awesome.
  
  More to come!
• 

  Senior Programmer

  Radical Entertainment

  November 2001 - May 2008

  Prototype (PS3,XBox 360, PC) still in development
  Designed and deployed the company-wide Maya World
  Editing Tool (WET), fully integrated into runtime streaming
  system and build pipeline. Supported NIS's, FMV's, memory
  leaks, game flow, world streaming and ongoing artist
  requests. Wrote checkpointing system for restoring game to
  previous state using lua pluto library.
  Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction (PS2/XBox/GC)
  released August 23, 2005
  Wrote and supported the world building tools in Maya, the
  streaming system, memory cards, NIS's, scripted cameras,
  credits, gameflow polish, and the pesky Gamecube reset.
  The Hulk (PS2/XBox/Gamecube/PC) released May 27, 2003
  Integrated the global Pure3D system into Maya for object
  placement. Wrote a linear world streaming system, NIS
  system, and all world building and object placement tools.

• Senior Software Engineer

  Secret Level

  May 2000 - October 2001

  Reduced geometry data using triangle stripping and byte-wise
  vertex position interpolation. Compressed animation data
  through selective frame removal and interpolation.
  Star Fighter (PS2) released February 21, 2001, by Lucas
  Arts
  Wrote and supported the Macromedia Flash for Games SDK.
  Lucas Arts used this SDK for all of their menu screens.
• 

  Software Engineer II

  The 3DO Company

  August 1999 - May 2000

  Battle Tanx: Global Assault (PSX) released March 17, 2000
  Developed tools with the win32 API and 3D Studio Max.
  Extended legacy code and deployed tool solutions within
  extremely tight deadlines and budget.

• Lead Programmer

  H2O Entertainment

  December 1995 - August 1999

  The Aidyn Chronicles (N64) released March 20, 2001
  Created Maya export plug-ins for the object database system
  used for The New Tetris. Wrote character behaviour API.
  Created high-level C++ objects for characters, levels and
  items on the Nintendo 64.
  The New Tetris (N64) released August 2, 1999
  Designed and implemented an object database system with
  Nintendo 64 runtime engine. All objects and values were
  animatable. Created plug-ins in Softimage|3D for export to the
  database. Everything 3D in the game used this system.
  Tetrisphere (N64) released August 11, 1997
  Wrote tools to convert from Lightwave 3D to the Nintendo 64.
  Created a texture UV-mapping tool using Motif in X Windows.
  Wrote animation playback and geometry display code for all
  characters, cut scenes, 3D icons, and in-game effects.