Trisha Butkowski

Trisha Butkowski

Cloth and Hair Technical Director at Sony Pictures Imagework

Senior CFX TD / Senior Character TD / 15 yrs

Vancouver, Canada

Hire Me

Head Of Cfx

Moana (2024)

Character Effects Lead

Trolls Holiday in Harmony (2021)

character effects artist

The Boss Baby 2 (2021)

Cloth and Hair Lead

Jumanji: The Next Level (2019)

Cloth and Hair Supervisor

The Angry Birds Movie 2 (2019)

Cloth Lead - CFX Technical Director

Smallfoot (2018)

Senior Cloth and Hair Technical Director

Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)

Senior Cloth and Hair Technical Director

Smurfs: The Lost Village (2017)

Senior Cloth and Hair Technical Director

The Angry Birds Movie (2016)

Character TD

The Boss Baby (2017)

Character TD

B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations

Character Technical Director

How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014)

Character TD

Turbo (2009)

Character TD

Puss in Boots (2011)

I have a passion for bringing together my creative and technical problem solving skills into character effects, rigging and programing. I am an experienced rigger who consistently brings enthusiasm, commutation, and multi tasking to my work. I have enjoyed the new challenges applying my skills as a rigger to dynamic cloth and hair setup. I enjoy applying my artistic skills to grooming hair and full body fur.
Work History

  • Cloth Technical Director Lead

    Sony Pictures Imageworks

    September 2018 - June 2019
    Vancouver, Canada

  • Senior Cloth and Hair Technical Director

    Sony Pictures Imageworks

    January 2015 - September 2018
    Vancouver, Canada

    Smurfs (Jan 2016 - Present)
    Hair grooming
    Hair Dynamic Setup

    Angry Birds (Jan 2015- Jan 2016)
    Hair, feather, and grass grooming.
    Hair and cloth dynamic setup.
    Hair and cloth shot work.
    Taught hair tips and tricks class.

  • Character Technical Director

    DreamWorks Animation

    July 2009 - December 2014
    Glendale, CA, United States

    - Rigged motion systems and deformations for body, cloth and hair on fat/skinny humans, very stretchy and cartoony ghosts, dragons, snails, and quadrupeds
    - Designed and implemented multiple python qt tools to improve setup time and workflow for in-house rigging application
    - Programed a python qt application that is used for cross show file syncing
    Overhauled and improved vehicle motion system and vehicle dynamics
    - Implemented short neck generic dragon with three body variations and seven different sets of accessories
    - Developed clothing and crowd support pipeline for generic characters
    - Provided support for multiple characters and pipeline issues as show crewed down
    - Taught deformation workshop and hair training class for in-house rigging application

    Worked on Boss Baby, B.O.O, How To Train Your Dragon2, Turbo, Puss In Boots

  • Rigging Contractor

    Texas A&M University

    2011 - 2012

    Contracted with Gil Rosenthal to work on Any Fish project developing fish rigs that can have the morphometrics(shape) change with given TPS data.

  • Research Assistant

    Texas A&M University

    August 2008 - December 2008

    - Developing computer-animated stimuli for use in animal behavior experiments.
    - Developing of a real-time interface between computer animations and behavioral tracking data.
    - Preparing/assisting in writing manuscripts for publication in refereed journals

  • Techincal Artist Intern

    Electronic Arts

    May 2008 - August 2008

    - Created and updated existing tools and scripts for Artist to use.
    - Worked on Facial Rig rig for Male and Female

  • Techincal Artist Intern

    EA

    May 2008 - August 2008
    Tiburon, FL

    - Created and updated existing tools and scripts for Artist to use.
    - Worked on Facial Rig rig for Male and Female

  • Graduate Assistant Teaching

    Texas A&M University

    January 2008 - May 2008

    - Teaching Assistant for Viza 615
    - Course work involved advanced animation, and creature rigging.
    - Responsible for technical instruction of Maya.

  • Graduate Assistant Non-Teaching

    Texas A&M University

    June 2007 - August 2007

    Audio Visual Work in the Viz department

  • KVR-TV Station Manager

    University of Texas at Austin

    June 2004 - May 2005

    - Responsible for running student television station, managing a $130,000 budget and a paid staff of 15, and over 200 active volunteers.
    - Make reports to the Texas Student Publication Board about current status of the station.

  • Sony Pictures Imageworks

    ? - Present

  • Sony Pictures Entertainment

    ? - Present

  • Sony Pictures Animation

    ? - Present
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Education

  • MS Visualization Science

    Texas A&M University

    August 2006 - May 2009

  • BS Radio-TV-Film

    The University of Texas at Austin

    August 2001 - May 2005