Patrick Thompson
Art Director

Summary

I am an Art Director & multidisciplinary artist with 10 years of experience in the casino gaming industry, and have been working as a professional artist since 2011. Across the three gaming companies that I have worked for, I have:

• Helped each form a new studio, establishing culture, communication channels, file sharing systems, workflows, pipelines, file templates, best practices, documentation, meeting schedules, etc.
• Helped spearhead each company’s transition into using Unity as their primary game development engine
• Been at the forefront of successful initiatives meant to have the greatest impact on the company’s bottom-line
• Been known for being hard-working, a beacon of positivity, easy to collaborate with, and a fountain of creative energy

Qualifications

• 10 years of gaming industry experience, with the ability to establish art team and studio direction that accounts for market trends, regulatory compliance, customer needs, and the competitive landscape
• 5 years of art direction experience, with demonstrated success of communicating creative direction, adapting teams to technological shifts and industry trends, and leading diverse teams of illustrators, animators, technical artists, and 3D artists
• Experienced in working with cross-functional teams and coordinating with different departmental leads to determine deliverable timelines, schedules, team resource allocation, and deliverable task backlogs
• Experience managing teams both locally and remotely, and well-versed with the challenges of remote team culture, scheduling meetings across diverse time zones, and secure file sharing management with remote teams
• Experience serving as a subject matter expert in illustration, graphic design, animation, Unity for artists, and gaming industry requirements and trends, happily sharing best practices, tools, inspiration, and joyful enthusiasm while simultaneously pushing creative and technical boundaries
• Comfortable and thriving when given complex problems that require creative solutions, including ones that can be implemented on a company-wide scale across multiple departments or studios

Technical Skills

• Expertise in the Adobe Suite, Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects, and Media Encoder
• Expertise in Unity as both an artist and manager, with experience implementing graphics and creating complex VFX, managing teams in Unity development, pipeline management and planning, and managing Unity-based tech artists
• Experienced in and managing teams in version control software, with extensive knowledge of file organization, naming conventions, and establishing and managing templates and standards for cross-studio and team use
• Experience establishing and managing software workflows, pipelines, and best practices for studios large and small
• Power user of Microsoft 365, including Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Teams, Forms, Planner, Sharepoint, etc.
• Power user of various management and enterprise software, such as Jira, Confluence, Smartsheet, LucidLink, Trello, etc.

Experience

Art Director
Everi Holdings Inc.
May 2022 – Present (2 years 1 month)

As Art Director of Everi’s Steady Hand Studio, I fulfill a key leadership role for our studio, and increasingly across the entire Art Department. I lead a dynamic, highly experienced team of artists, animators, and tech artists as we spearhead Everi’s inaugural Unity games, taking on some of the most complex, challenging, and impactful projects in the organization. With a respectful, collaborative approach to art direction, I empower the team to improve in their own unique ways and encourage their growth in directions that make a positive impact on the whole org.

• Direct team management with a focus on positivity and collaboration, fostering a healthy, respectful studio culture
• Artistic leadership for our Unity workflow and organization-wide pipeline, refining our new processes for efficiency
• Documentation creation for new initiatives and departmental support, with a focus on art standards and Unity training
• Collaborating with cross-disciplinary leads for seamless game development, resource management, and schedule alignment
• Building connections across the organization to enhance team support
• Collaborating with game designers to arrive at a single vision, and aligning the art team to it throughout development
• Providing mentorship and guidance for career development with weekly one on one meetings with direct reports

Creative Director
IntuiCode Gaming Corporation
Jan 2019 – Jun 2022 (3 years 6 months)

As Creative Director at Intuicode, I art-directed dozens of games, leading to a clear rise in the overall quality of our products over time. I helped our studio grow in size & skill to meet the demand for our product and the challenges brought on by the increasingly competitive HHR market space. Intuicode and its partner Exacta made an enormous impact on the entire gaming industry.

• Directly managed art direction of all new games, working with leadership and game design to form a cohesive vision for whole product lines, coordinate sets of skins of math models for maximum ROI, and create a diverse slot game catalog
• Led the team in the development of our own slot game implementation of the Unity render engine, increasing our creative capabilities to put us on par with any competitor and increase the company’s value and competitiveness
• Functioned as a Producer, planning and running cross-departmental meetings, facilitating communications, keeping the team on schedule, handling documentation templates, art templates, and running on-site cabinet reviews
• Managed team on-boarding and training, as well as the recruiting and hiring process for new artists and engineers
• Helped manage product planning, pipeline management, and outsourcing firms
• Lucky enough to also illustrate & animate alongside my team for 1 out of every 5 games that I art-directed
• I also helped manage this team through the Covid Pandemic, and successfully adapted our studio to the changes it brought
  
  

Graphic Artist III (Senior)
AGS – American Gaming Systems
Jul 2014 – Sep 2017 (3 years 3 months)

As a Graphic Artist, I provided illustrations and animations for video slot machines for the casino floor. I brought a lot of positive energy to the new studio and team, and was especially enthusiastic about coming up with new challenging ideas and how to realize them. Our studio manager said that one of the greatest assets that I brought to our team was that when it came to our work, I was “always just so damn happy about it!” I’ve been told I’m infectious. In a good way. Probably.

• Created artwork starting at the concept phase and took it all the way through animation, testing, & delivery
• Promoted after 1 year from Graphic Artist II to Graphic Artist III (Senior Artist)
• Went from being new in After Effects to becoming our team’s leader in all things After Effects and animation in 1 year
• Helped spearhead company’s entry in Unity development and collaborate with small team to create AGS’ first Unity game
• Worked with IT to create a render farm to increase efficiency for the whole art department for After Effects and 3D
• Helped interview, train, and mentor new art recruits

Owner, Artist
PK Game Art and Illustration
Mar 2011 – Feb 2020 (9 years)

Like most artists, for many years I worked as a freelance artist, both as my primary job as well as a side job while employed full-time. I started my art career while living in China – teaching English by day and illustrating by night. I soon moved to LA, where I established myself as a freelance game artist. Over the years I worked on dozens of games in a variety of roles, and did my fair share of parallax backgrounds, tiling platforms, hexagon tiles, aliens, weapons, concept art, book covers, and card designs.

• Provided game art, illustration, motion design, VFX, and animation services to studios, indie devs, and other business clients
• Created contracts, estimates, billing documents, marketing materials, and other documents entailed in running a business
• Established art direction for games, and collaborated with game designers to realize their vision and enhance their ideas
• Worked both solo and on larger teams of contractors for clients like Mattel
• Recruited and directed other artists for larger art projects

Assistant Director; EFL teacher
Buckland International Education Group
Feb 2009 – Mar 2012 (3 years 2 months)

After college, I escaped to China to seek adventure and freedom. I learned I had a passion for teaching and helping others grow, learned Chinese, and started my art career. I gained a love of Chinese culture and knowledge of their artistic trends and traditions.

Assistant Director

• Trained and led over 100 foreign teachers annually in how to best teach English to Chinese students, and how to thrive in a strange and wondrous new culture and country that can be challenging at times
  • Assisted with teacher administration, human resources, planning, and recruiting
  • Provided graphic design and illustration for marketing needs, from billboard ads to logos and brochures
  • Illustrated & authored the “Non-Stop Talking” EFL textbook series, used throughout China in over 100 public and private schools
  • After 1 year, promoted from EFL teacher to Assistant Director

English as a Foreign Language (EFL) Teacher

• Taught English as a foreign language to Chinese students of all ages (pre-K to adults) in 3 different provinces
  • Crafted curricula with school administrators, and helped align lessons to their annual goals
  • Helped establish the EFL office in a large public school as their first foreign teacher ever
  • Helped run and teach in summer school programs
  • Won 1st Prize, Guangxi Province Official English Teaching Competition 2009, by demoing one of my lessons to a group of students on stage, live in front of an audience of over 1000 Chinese teachers of English
    
    

Education

Gnomon School of Visual Effects
Advanced Digital Painting
2012

Brigham Young University
Major: Illustration; Minor: Creative Writing
2004 – 2008

Brigham Young University – Idaho
Major: Architecture
Dean’s List
2003 – 2004