Say hello to Joe!

We love to give you an insight into who we are at REALTIME and we are our people, so say hello to our new Lighting Artist Joe!

 

Tell me a little bit about yourself?

My name is Joe Worthington, I’m 31 and from Manchester. I studied Computer Visualisation and Animation at Bournemouth University which landed me an exciting post-graduate job at my local Tesco! I then moved to London and got my foot in the door of the VFX industry as render support. Through this I was fortunate enough to be moved into lighting where I worked on several exciting (and some less exciting) blockbusters. After seven and a bit years working in the south I felt the pull of home and moved back up north, eventually leading me to RealtimeUK!

 

What’s your role at REALTIME?

My primary role here will be CG lighting and look-dev but I’ll also be handling compositing duties.

 

What first sparked your interest in 3D Art?

I’d love to say I had a revelatory experience during a classic film at a young age and this has been my dream ever since, but it was nothing that poetic. I come from a fine art background but I also enjoyed coding, this in conjunction with a love of film led me down the path to 3D art. While it may have been a decision decided with logic I couldn’t be happier with the choice I made. I love working in this industry and am passionate about the work I create.

 

So, what does an average day consist of for you?

A lighters first job in the morning is to check the farm and see how their overnight renders fared, investigate errored frames, resubmit where needed and generally assess render times. I’ll then quickly comp up anything which is ready so it can be reviewed in dailies. Tasks throughout the day will generally be a balancing act of shot lighting, asset lookdev and compositing. Late afternoon is the time to make sure renders are prepared to run overnight, ensuring I’m pulling together all the latest and greatest assets passed on by other artists.

Oh and lots of cups of tea, especially in the morning, I need a strong brew to wake me up.

 

What’s the best thing about working here?

So far the best thing at RealtimeUK has been the people, they’re an exceptionally talented bunch. I’m always looking to improve and learn so I’m excited to work as part of a team which will push me to be a better artist.

 

Are there any upcoming things in the industry that you think people need to keep an eye out for?

AI learning is a growing area for the industry, while its only had specific applications thus far like facial capture, I hear it’s also being looked into as a means of denoising ray-traced renders. It will be very interesting to see where else in the pipeline it can be incorporated. In terms of lighting and rendering, game engines are producing images of increasingly impressive fidelity and with NVIDIA making a push for ray traced graphics on the GPU I’m curious to see how, if at all, this will affect the industry.

 

Tell me a fun fact about yourself?

I once survived having a pub fall on me. Made the news.