Summary
Overview
Work History
Education
Skills
Software
Accomplishments
Certification
Conferences
Timeline
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Stefan Hamann

Stefan Hamann

Technical Artist
Chengdu

Summary

Technical 3D Generalist with a high sense of responsibility, keen perception and a weakness for accurate planning and reporting. Good at problem solving while going to the bottom of things to fix bugs, propose new ideas, improvements or just recommend workflows for higher efficiency. I am eager to grow my knowledge and tend to write my own scripts and tools if I find potential for automation and efficiency gain.
Currently mainly responsible for procedural Biome and ecosystem creation, but also doing a lot of interdisciplinary and training support for other departments and collaborating studios (Received the internal "Trainer of the year award 2022").
Before that, support for Environment/Levelart with objectbank-handling, procedural tools & generation, asset optimization and reporting, in-engine scripting & tools (C#, MaxScript) and general workflow-guidance (in-engine and DCC), occasional shader-development (in-engine nodesystem) and general debugging support.
Formerly responsible for the whole 3D Character production (3D-Models, integration and polishing for Characters, Bosses, Weapons, Armorsets and Props) for several projects, including planning, negotiation and supervising outsource-partners (During that time I was able to reduce the outsourcing-cost for the character-department by around 10%).

Overview

10
10
years of professional experience
5
5
years of post-secondary education
5
5
Certifications
3
3
Languages

Work History

Senior Technical Artist

Ubisoft
Chengdu
04.2022 - Current

Projects: Assassins Creed Red

Responsibilities:

  • Ownership of procedural scatter recipes to populate Biomes and procedural tools with vegetation, rocks etc. (CPU and GPU)
  • Responsible for Wildlife integration in Biomes and Ecosystem and related procedural tech development
  • Driving in-engine feature development for specific technical requirements
  • Writing in-engine scripts to get reports on data and streamline workflows
  • Setting up prototypes to iterate on and investigate pros and con
  • Bug and feature improvement reporting and support for engine-tech development
  • Guiding and mentoring local and collaborating Team-members on technical topics related to world-building (including procedural, terrain, water, asset handling, performance, world settings and generation)
  • Creating onboarding training plans and schedules for TA newcomers and executing them accordingly
  • Keeping up to date on latest internal engine feature development to provide proper support for local teams

Technical Artist

Ubisoft
Chengdu
08.2019 - 04.2022

Projects: Assassins Creed Valhalla | Immortals Fenyx Rising - Myth of the Eastern Realms | Skull & Bones

Responsibilities:

  • Support for all kinds of technical topics (mainly procedural tools/generation & terrain-handling, Asset-creation, Optimization, Functionality of GameplayAssets, FX etc.)
  • Establish guidelines for tools, modelling, LevelArt etc. and keep documentation up-to-date
  • Taking care of technical Asset-validation and instruct Artists how to work in a more efficient and optimized manner
  • Shader-dev-support for specific cases (e.g. FX, Gameplay elements etc.)
  • Writing tools/scripts in C# to support work in the game-engine (Anvil)
  • Script-support for 3ds Max (Maxscript)
  • Using Houdini for destruction-setups, debugging of procedural generation and scattering
  • Creating Houdini-Utilities (.otl/.hda) for general purpose (leveraging vex and python)
  • Individual support for specific workflows to make work more efficient for LevelArt
  • Finding and optimizing problematic/costly situations in Level/EnvironmentArt
  • General debug-support for all kind of topics
  • Planning and guidance for new colleagues onboarding

Technical Artist

Deck 13 GmbH
Frankfurt
04.2017 - 07.2019

Projects: The Surge 2 | The Surge DLCs (4x)

Responsibilities:

  • Writing tools (currently mostly Max-Script) to simplify daily work routines and enhance efficiency
  • Prototyping complex character-assets (characters, bosses, gear/armor-sets, weapons) and finding solutions for difficult character-setups/requirements
  • Integrate and validate characters-assets in-engine and check for problems
  • Evaluating engine-rendering and check for performance drop-downs
  • Optimizing assets to keep them in given memory-budgets (polycount, textures, shadowcasting/Lods, etc.)
  • Communicate engine-bugs to the tech-department and working closely together to find solutions
  • Helping coworkers with finding solutions for different software-problems
  • Creating physical breakable- and cloth-assets using NVidia Physx/Apex
  • Adjust assets to meet gameplay-relevant requirements

Character Outsourcing Manager

Deck 13 GmbH
Frankfurt
09.2015 - 07.2019

Projects: The Surge 2 | The Surge DLCs (4x) | The Surge

Responsibilities:

  • Responsible for the whole 3D character-outsourcing process (including characters (humanoid, non-humanoid, bosses, organic, non-organic), armor-sets, weapons, additional props)
  • Estimating and negotiating production-time
  • Ensure to meet deadlines and stay in the available budgets
  • Creating 3D-prototypes for every character-asset for internal use and as guideline for outsourcing-companies (closely working together with concept-, animation- and gamedesign-department to meet all requirements)
  • Preparing detailed briefings and communicating needs to outsource-companies (with respect to technical requirements, e.g. polycount, texture-size, shadowcasting/LODs, solid/transparent parts etc.)
  • Checking submissions for errors or necessary adjustments and feedback them
  • Preparing and integration of final models in the game-engine (including mesh-adjustments, skinning, material-settings)
  • Final polishing of character-assets (performance-wise and textures)
  • Fully creating assets in-house on my own, if time allowed it

3D-Art-Supervisor and Tutor

SAE Institute Berlin
Berlin
11.2013 - 09.2015
  • Supporting students with questions and problems
  • Assisting the head-instructor and external tutors
  • Preparing classes and teach students
  • Preparing and carry out exams for students

3D Generalist

Freelancer for TV-Series Newtopia
Berlin
10.2014 - 11.2014
  • Creating an interactive movie-set for the film-producers
  • Creating a whole environment based on real-life landscaping-plans and satellite-data
  • Creating several accurate 3D-cameras based on actual datasheets
  • Creating a character for real-world size comparison
  • Working closely with a programmer for the Camera-behavior and other game-play features

2D/3D Generalist Internship

Promotion-Software Potsdam
Berlin-Potsdam
01.2014 - 11.2014

Projects: Emergency 5 | Emergency mobile

Responsibilities:

  • Creating 2D-sprites for the mobile game
  • Building levels/maps and implementing basic game-mechanics for the mobile game
  • 3D-Artist for Emergency 5
  • Animation and Rigging for several characters and animals
  • Implementing and polishing motion-capturing-data

Education

Bachelor of Science - Applied Artificial Intelligence

University of Applied Science
Berlin/Germany
06.2023 - Current

Bachelor of Arts - Interactive Animation

Middlesex University / SAE-Institute
London/Berlin
04.2012 - 03.2015

SAE Diploma - Game Development

SAE Institute
Berlin
04.2012 - 10.2013

Skills

Organization & Planning (for myself and department-wise, supporting project management and producer)

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Software

Autodesk 3ds Max

Adobe Photoshop

Substance-Painter/Designer

Marmoset Toolbag

Pixologic ZBrush

Autodesk Maya

3Rd party engines Unity/Unreal

Keyshot

Quixel-Suite / Megascans

Office Tools (Excel, Word etc)

C#

Python

MaxScript

MelScript

Accomplishments

  • Ubisoft: Internal trainer of the year award 2022

Certification

University of Michigan - Python 3 Programming

Conferences

  • 2016-08 Volunteer at GamesCom Cologne / Germany
  • 2015-04 Volunteer at Quo Vadis Game Developer Conference in Berlin / Germany
  • 2015-03 Volunteer at 3D-Printshow in Berlin / Germany
  • 2014 -10 Volunteer at SAE Alumni Convention in Berlin / Germany
  • 2014-04 Volunteer at Quo Vadis Game Developer Conference in Berlin / Germany
  • 2012-10 Volunteer at SAE Alumni Convention in Berlin / Germany
  • 2012-04 Participation at Quo Vadis Game Developer Conference in Berlin / Germany

Timeline

Bachelor of Science - Applied Artificial Intelligence

University of Applied Science
06.2023 - Current

Senior Technical Artist

Ubisoft
04.2022 - Current

University of Michigan - Python 3 Programming

09-2021

Google IT Automation with Python

08-2021

Chinese Proficiency Test - HSK 4 / 汉语水平考试四级

11-2020

Technical Artist

Ubisoft
08.2019 - 04.2022

Technical Artist

Deck 13 GmbH
04.2017 - 07.2019

Character Outsourcing Manager

Deck 13 GmbH
09.2015 - 07.2019

3D Generalist

Freelancer for TV-Series Newtopia
10.2014 - 11.2014

ZBrush Certification

06-2014

2D/3D Generalist Internship

Promotion-Software Potsdam
01.2014 - 11.2014

3D-Art-Supervisor and Tutor

SAE Institute Berlin
11.2013 - 09.2015

Autodesk Maya Certification

10-2013

Bachelor of Arts - Interactive Animation

Middlesex University / SAE-Institute
04.2012 - 03.2015

SAE Diploma - Game Development

SAE Institute
04.2012 - 10.2013
Stefan HamannTechnical Artist