Manager Technical Support

**** *** ** ** *****

CHRIS LESAGE

Montreal, Quebec H2J 3H9

CHARACTER RIGGING & TECHNICAL DIRECTION

Telephone: 514-***-****

Email: *****@***********.***

http://chrislesage.com

Advanced, animator-friendly rigging, versatile technical support and

ad-hoc problem solving in XSI and Maya, throughout the animation pipeline.

Offering full 3D character rigging, script/plugin development and technical

direction to animated and visual effects projects.

EXPERIENCE

CHARACTER RIGGER, TOOL DEVELOPMENT, CLASSICS ANIMATED 2009-2010

Main Projects: Treasure Island, Men of Iron (animated feature films), Shilvi animated series

Character rigging and advanced facial animation rigging including Face Robot and custom tools

Stream-lined rigging using scripts and a highly-reusable framework

Developed animation tools, synoptic interfaces and other animator goodies

Developed plugins and tools for quickly working with motion capture data

Technical consultation (modeling and rendering)

CHARACTER RIGGER, MOKKO STUDIO 2008-2009

Main Projects & Clients: Les Podcats (tv series), Dino Body, Last Days (tv documentaries), Gatorade, Alpina,

more... (ad spots)

Cartoony character, prop and mechanical rigging for animated television series and several ad projects

Creature setup and technical support for 2 photo-realistic dinosaur documentaries

Implemented time-saving tools; pose preset plugins, synoptic interfaces and auto-riggers

MAYA GENERALIST, BARXSEVEN 2007

Main Project: Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium (feature film vfx)

Toy animation

Render support (shaders, render passes and render management) and particle effects

CREATURE SETUP ARTIST, DAMNFX 2006-2007

Main Projects: Dinos Alive!, Sea Monsters, (IMAX films) Race to Mars, Ice Corps (television)

Creature rigs and tech support for stereoscopic IMAX film (dinosaurs and prehistoric sea creatures)

Particle-based fish school animation, dynamic behavior, animated swimming cycles, water particulate effects

Ad-hoc problem solving: mechanical vehicle rigs, semi-automatic squid and insect rigs, optimized modeling for

ultra-high-res plant characters, etc.

Particle effects and layout animation (planetary dust storm, spaceship gas leak)

Chris Lesage 4306 Rue De La Roche, Montreal, Quebec H2J 3H9 514-***-**** *****@***********.***

CHARACTER ANIMATOR / TECHNICAL DIRECTOR, NEW MACHINE STUDIOS 2004-2006

Main Projects: Raven Tales (tv series), The Big Rock Story (short film), Westjet (safety video), more...

Character animation for 6x22min television series, and various other projects

Rigging and setup for dozens of characters

Animation supervision on several episodes of Raven Tales, The Big Rock Story and various small projects.

Studio manager, responsible for technical direction, scheduling animators and overseeing internship program.

Modeled characters for 3D-printed toy prototypes

Supervised video game proof-of-concept for Raven Tales (assets, models, in-game animation, etc.)

Lighting and rendering on Raven Tales pilot episode

CHARACTER ANIMATOR / MODELER, AURENYA ENTERTAINMENT 2001-2002

Main Project: Elfkins First Christmas (tv pilot)

Character animation

Modeling of main villain characters and several props

Modeling, rigging and animation for an ad spot

EDUCATION, TRAINING & OTHER EXPERIENCE

TECHNICAL DIRECTION IN XSI USING PYTHON, CGWORKSHOPS - 2010

An 8-week workshop teaching TD best-practice principles and Python development

Developed several plugins and tools including an auto-rigger and mocap tools

DIRECTOR, QUICKDRAW ANIMATION SOCIETY 2005-2006

First year of a two year term as volunteer on Board of Directors at QAS, an artist-run center in Calgary.

Consulted on the introduction of 3D programs to the society

Animated (paper cut-out) on a collaborative short film

Spoke about the 3D industry at an animation screening

ANIMATION & SPECIAL EFFECTS DIPLOMA, APPLIED MULTIMEDIA TRAINING CENTRES 2001

Completed several student films from storyboard/design to final comp

The school's focus was broad, teaching all aspects of the 3D pipeline

Trained in Softimage 3D on Unix workstations

PRODUCTION SKILLS

Character rigging, Softimage XSI, Maya, facial rigging, skinning, technical direction, scripting and plugin devel-

opment: Python, Javascript, MEL, general trouble-shooting

OTHER SKILLS

Character animation, task/project management, Photoshop, GIMP, spreadsheets, Linux, music composition/

synthesis, Actionscript and html5 game dev, PHP, web design, illustration

RECOMMENDATIONS

I enjoyed working in collaboration with Chris on various projects here. He has shown flexibility, performance,

and a rigorous methodology in his work. He has also shown a great will to learn more, and grow as a more sen-

ior setup td, which I know for sure he will become.

Laurent Taillefer, Lead TD / R&D, DamnFx

Chris is a hard worker who never complains. He went above and beyond at New Machine Studios when he

stepped into the role of TD from animation in the middle of production and not only took on the rigging workload,

but streamlined and improved our rigs in the process. He is entrepreneurial and inventive.

Colin Curwen, Founder and Executive Producer, New Machine Studios Inc.

Chris is an astute, versatile and autonomous worker who possesses great initiative and has a pro-active atti-

tude. Possessing both a great attention to detail and a systematic approach, Chris is able to troubleshoot and

problem solve effectively. As a character setup artist and animator Chris demonstrates a great knack of getting

the job done on time and most importantly, on budget. I would recommend Chris to any company looking for

qualified and talented cg artists.

Dean Gula, VFX Coordinator, DamnFx

Page 2

Contact this candidate