Billy Chatterton UI/UX Game Developer |  |
Billy Chatterton UI/UX Game Developer | |
 |
Contact Information: |  | |
| Location: | San Diego, California U.S.A. | ||
| Email: | billy.chatterton@gmail.com | ||
| Website: | www.billychatterton.com | ||
Social Networks: | |||
| LinkedIn: | Connect on LinkedIn | ||
| Twitter: | Follow on Twitter | ||
I am currently a User Interface Programmer at Epic Games' Psyonix Studio and have had the pleasure of working on the full range of UI/UX disciplines from mockups and wireframes through to implementation and bug fixing. I have a wide range of experience from working at a startup indie studio Motiga on their first title Gigantic, a large corporation at Microsoft on a small world-traveling strike team helping Crytek ship Ryse: Son of Rome as an Xbox One launch title, to Psyonix a successful established studio with Rocket League released on nearly every current platform. I have a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in Game Art and Design from the Art Institute of Seattle that reinvigorated my endless thirst for learning.
Learning and solving new problems are the most enjoyable aspects of my job. Video games have a unique balance of cutting-edge technology and artistic creativity that provides an endless supply of knowledge to acquire. My passions lie in creating great experiences through amazing visuals and immersive UI that draw the players deeper into the game’s atmosphere. I am living my dream putting my skills to work with extremely talented people in the game industry collaborating to make breathtaking experiences that people never forget.
Thank you for taking the time to check out my site, I hope you find something you enjoy!
I was contracted directly with Motiga to work on their Xbox One and Windows 10 title Gigantic. My main job was to take the provided wire frames and create the screens in Flash, then write the needed code to make them functional in ActionScript 3, UnrealScript and C++. I contributed to UX planning meetings both internally and with our Microsoft partners. This was my first opportunity to work closely with a Localization team and adjusting for multiple languages. I also worked closely with QA on bug reporting, tracking and fixing.
User Interface, Programming, Flash, Scaleform, Unreal Engine 3, ActionScript, UnrealScript, C++
I was contracted at Microsoft to work on Crytek's Xbox One launch title. My main job was to take the wire frames provided and re-create them in Flash. Using ActionScript 2 through the Scaleform middleware the screens were brought into CryEngine 3 and made functional in game. I worked closely with Crytek's German studio including two trips to Frankfurt. Towards the end of the project I worked closely with Xbox Live programmers to ensure multiplayer screens relayed the complex game state changes during matchmaking accurately.
User Interface, Programming, Flash, Scaleform, CryEngine, ActionScript, C++
This video shows a proof of concept build I created to improve my skills with the Unity engine, be able to build and deploy to Android, and work with motion controls. I also replaced the built in physics system with collision mesh, ray tracing calls and collision volumes to keep the player on the desired path. Currently, I have abandoned the project due to lighting limitations in the free version of Unity, but may move forward in Unreal 4 at some point. I tried a lot of new things and this was a very successful personal project.
Game Design, Programming, Unity, C#, Android
This was a group class project that I worked on at the Art Institute. I was responsible for the functionality of the User Interface. The main UI was created in Flash, and used the Scaleform middleware to communicate with the Unreal Development Kit. Trigger volumes were placed in the map and events had to be passed back and forth between Flash and Unreal using Kismet. Most of the artwork was handled by others, but I did create the icons, layouts, animations, etc. This game can be downloaded from my games page.
User Interface, Programming, Unreal, Flash, Scaleform, ActionScript, Kismet
Luftwaffe is an ActionScript 3 Flash game I created as a solo project for one of my game programming classes. It is a top down vertical scrolling shooter in the same vein as 1942 and Raiden. While Luftwaffe could still use a lot of polish, it does have multiple weapon types, power-ups, score tracking, a decent UI, and the longer you play the more enemies appear on screen at once. Part of the requirements for the class was publishing the game on the internet so it is playable on Kongregate.
Game Design, Programming, User Interface, Modeling, Texturing, Maya, Photoshop, Flash, ActionScript
This is a puzzle physics based shooter that was one of the last group projects I worked on at the Art Institute. I created modular environment assets some of which are shown in the last image. I also created some of the puzzles, worked on level design, and pre-production documentation. I did the lighting for these screenshots (not the actual game) in the Unity 3D engine. Download from my games page.
Modeling, Texturing, Lighting, Level Design, Maya, Photoshop, Unity
This was another of my final projects: recreate Post Alley under Pike's Market in Seattle inside the Unity 3D game engine and light it in a realistic and interesting way. This involved a few trips with a camera shooting hundreds of reference photos and using Google Maps to verify the scale was correct. It was also a realistic opportunity to work within the limitation of Unity 3D's shaders at the time.
Modeling, Texturing, Lighting, Maya, Photoshop, Unity
These images are a sampling of Mental Ray renders from my time at the Art Institute. Everything in the bedroom and weapons images are mine. The Toy Workshop was a collaboration with Krista Ferderer and Danielle Vraney, the lighting and shaders are mine, but some of the toy models and textures are theirs. The flooded warehouse model is by Adam Crespi, but all of the lighting was done by me.
Modeling, Texturing, Lighting, Rendering, Maya, Zbrush, Photoshop, Mental Ray
This 2012 Dodge Challenger was modeled in Autodesk Maya and rendered with Mental Ray. My goal was to create a high poly model that will hold up rendered at HD720 with 1/4 of the car in the frame. This was part of my graduation portfolio from The Art Institute of Seattle. Like much of my art from school, it was abandoned after graduation due to student licensing restrictions. It remains one of my favorites.
Modeling, Lighting, Rendering, Maya, Mental Ray
The Cleopatra Statue was created as part of my internship at Gas Powered Games. The internship was creating models and texturing for a statue and topiary content pack for Age of Empires Online. This was a wonderful opportunity to match an existing art style, work with a small poly count and fixed perspective camera on a professional game engine. The model was created in Maya, textured in Photoshop and the bottom left images are in game screen captures. Unfortunately, AOEO has since been shut down.
Modeling, Texturing, Maya, PhotoShop
Rocket League is Psyonix's PC and multi-console rocket powered vehicular soccer, hockey and basketball game. It focuses on a clean minimalistic UI easily navigable by mouse and controller. Being a Games as a Service title much effort is put into player progression, retention, emphasizing new features and content, and ongoing purchases. You can find more about Rocket League at its official website.
Gigantic is Motiga's Xbox One, Windows 10, and Steam title. It is free-to-play and pits two teams of five against each other with the strategy of a MOBA and the combat of an action/shooter with distinct playable heroes. Game state and resource management is kept prominent in the HUD and an extensive store supports it's free-to-play business model. You can find more at Gigantic's official website.
Sunset Overdrive is Insomniac Games' Xbox One over-the-top action-adventure third-person shooter. It has an amazing stylized UI that keeps track of customizable players, open-world objectives and multiplayer elements. I was contracted at Microsoft to design prototype UI elements for community and event player feedback. You can find more about Sunset Overdrive at its official website.
Ryse: Son of Rome is Crytek's Xbox One launch title later ported to Steam. It's a third-person action-adventure hack and slash game set in ancient Rome. Ryse's front end UI is a graphical improvement over Crysis 3, stylishly keeping track of numerous upgrades, inventory, collectables, and individual level checkpoint progression. You can find out more about Ryse: Son of Rome at its official website.
Ingress is Niantic's iOS and Android game that along with the Field Trip app established their augmented reality platform before spinning off from Google and using the platform to create Pokémon GO. I worked on geolocation data for their platform and content creation and selection for both Ingress and Field Trip. You can find out more about Ingress at its official website.
Age of Empires Online was Gas Powered Games' Steam and Games for Windows free-to-play real-time strategy game. The art is heavily stylized and focused on creating low polygon assets that are immediately identifiable with strong silhouettes. Online has shutdown, but one of the models I created is in the modeling section of my site and the Age of Empires series still has an official website.
Skills | ||
| User Interface / UI | User Experience / UX | |
| Programming / Scripting | Visualization / Wireframe / Layout | |
| Iteration / Prototyping | User Modeling / User Research | |
| Scalable Dynamic Design / Localization | Task Optimization / Analytics | |
Software | ||
| Visual Studio / FlashDevelop / Perforce | Adobe Flash / Photoshop / Creative Cloud | |
| Unreal Engine 3 & 4 / CryEngine 3 | Unity / Scaleform / Console SDKs | |
Languages | ||
| ActionScript 2 & 3 / JavaScript | UnrealScript / C++ / C# | |
Game Credits | ||
| ||
Experience | ||
 | User Interface Programmer | 6/2017-Current |
| Psyonix | San Diego, California | |
| ||
 | User Interface Developer | 6/2015-6/2017 |
| Motiga (contracted and hired) | Bellevue, Washington | |
| ||
 | User Interface Designer / Developer | 6/2013-3/2014 |
| Microsoft contract (extended twice) | Redmond, Washington | |
| ||
 | Data Specialist | 6/2012-6/2013 |
| Niantic / Google contract | Bothell, Washington | |
| ||
 | 3D Modeling Internship | 1/2011-3/2011 |
| Gas Powered Games | Redmond, Washington | |
| ||
| Previous work experience in Information Technology, Sales, Customer Service, and Management positions are available on request. | ||
Education | ||
 | Bachelor of Fine Arts in Game Art and Design | 6/2012 |
| The Art Institute of Seattle | Seattle, Washington | |
| ||
