Like many who grew up in that era, I was heavily influenced by ID Software’s Doom series and spent many hours playing death match games with Peter and friends on a local BBS called “Jungle ][“. Peter sadly died in a tragic car accident alongside another friend before they finished high school, and I’m forever grateful for the world of wonder that he imparted in me in our brief time together. When I was in high school in the mid-90s, my best friend Peter Ta turned me onto computers, the DIY spirit of “build your own box” computing from that era, the fun of DOS shareware/warez games, and the pre-internet bulletin board system (BBS) culture of dialing into local BBS’s on our modems. I have a fond memory of receiving an ascii-art Christmas tree email from our school principal that must’ve been sometime around 1987/1988, which is kind of amazing to think back on. Gilkenson, and I didn’t realize how much of an influence her curiosity had on me. In grade school, my 3rd/4th grade teacher was really into computers and had our school hooked up to what I now realize must’ve been an early pre-internet darpa net. I did end up learning that stuff can be toxic and corrosive, as the plastic lens of one of my play microscopes was one of the unfortunate tragedies. I remember going through a phase where I would mix all kinds of random household chemicals / solutions together to see what happens, and luckily, I didn’t hurt myself or my siblings in the process. When I was a kid I was always doing things like taking electronics apart to see how they work, see what’s inside, and see if I could “fix” them or at least put them back together without breaking anything. I can’t discount the fact that my ability to learn new programming languages was probably helped by having to quickly learn a new language as a kid. I didn’t speak a word of English at a young age, but the neighborhood kids were so friendly that we basically picked it up in no time after we moved to a new neighborhood at around age 3. The trio started and continue to run their own business to this day, which has always been an example to me as to how you can create something from nothing when you have the space to experiment, fail, and try again with the wisdom from past mistakes. My father, now retired, was a civil engineer, my uncle a dentist, and my mother an accountant, and they brought with them a strong entrepreneurial work ethic that they instilled in us from an early age. My parents immigrated to the US from Ecuador shortly before I was born. Tell us a bit about yourself – how did you get your start in visual effects and/or animation? Senior Software Engineer - Architecture Lead
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