Bryan Ewert has several years of experience in technical modeling and animation, having made his start in the computer graphics industry as an artist. In 1998 Bryan was introduced to Maya Software. Intoxicated by the power of Maya Embedded Language (MEL), Bryan starting writing several scripts to aid with his modeling and animation tasks. Within two years, Bryan migrated from artist to full-time programmer.

A regular contributor to Highend3D (formerly the Lumis3D forum), Bryan started his own personal 'MEL How-To' Web site which today serves over 100 Maya scripting and API tutorials.

Bryan is currently Senior Tools Programmer at Radical Entertainment in Vancouver, Canada.

Bryan Ewert on the web: www.ewertb.com

Q. How did you get involved in the 3D computer graphics industry?
A. I was introduced to 3D computer graphics in 1991 when I joined a 3D Special Interest Group with the Amiga Users of Calgary (AMUC). This was back in the days when "rendering" meant watching a picture evolve, literally, pixel by pixel.

Revolution struck when NewTek released the Video Toaster and LightWave3D, and I was hooked. After several years of dabbling in 3D as a hobby I was approached by a member of AMUC who wanted to start up an animation company. Our first short, Plug Out Of Luck, was accepted into the animation theaters at SIGGRAPH95 in Orlando, Florida.

Q. How do you use Maya software?
A. Of course, I can't talk about Maya without talking about Maya Embedded Language (MEL). Having every tool scriptable opens the mind to infinite possibilities. Nothing is a closed system; everything is extensible. It is Maya's programmability that was the catalyst for my paradigm shift from artist to programmer.

I have a system which I call "object oriented MEL." I derive a layout of controls which extends the functionality of Maya's base controls –a colour swatch with a drop-down menu of user-defined colours; a control which offers hue, saturation, value, red, green and blue from a single colour slider; a text entry field that remembers the previous items you've entered–and these controls can "drop into" any MEL script as simply as any other control.

I am an advocate for using Maya as the front-end for all content development. It is obviously well suited for visual models and animation. Through MEL and its plug-in API, Maya can offer a unified interface for all tools. My goal is such that the artist need not be concerned with what is native to Maya and what is an in-house tool.

For H2O Entertainment's Aidyn Chronicles: The First Mage I used Maya's scripted Artisan tool to allow the artists to interactively place objects and characters on free-form terrain. All art content for Aidyn was managed through a MEL interface in Maya. This provided a complete overview of all assets used in the game, and offered simple revision tracking. All of the art was exported to the game pipeline through this same interface.

H2O's Lead Programmer designed a particle system library for the game's run-time. To allow the artists to be able to visualize these particle effects I created a custom shape node that was driven by the same library used in the game. The artist was able to achieve the look needed for the game without leaving the familiarity of Maya's interface.

Q. What projects have you worked on?
A. 1995 Plug Out Of Luck, animated short JUUL:Animation, Calgary, Canada Accepted into the animation theaters at SIGGRAPH'95 in Orlando, Florida.

1996 A Trio Of Visually-Challenged Robotical Rodents, animated short JUUL:Animation, Calgary, Canada

1997 A.T.C.K.S. (Army Training Computerized Knowledge System), Computer Based Training ICOM Productions, Inc., Calgary, Canada

1997 Tetrisphere, game, Nintendo64
H2O Entertainment Ltd., Calgary, Canada

1998 The New Tetris, game, Nintendo64
H2O Entertainment Ltd., Calgary, Canada

2000 Aidyn Chronicles: The First Mage, game, Nintendo64

H2O Entertainment Ltd., Vancouver, Canada

Q. What makes this industry so exciting to you?
A. Frankly, it's the amount of talent out there. I look at what artists are doing and I am blown away by the results they're getting. The daily challenge for me is keeping up with that talent. Artists are always thinking one step further, asking, "What if we could do this?" I want them to be able to find out.

Q. Where do you see the industry going in the next five years?
A. RAM is cheap. Hard drives are cheap. And the consumer has an insatiable appetite for a bigger and better experience. Creating an experience this large is a tremendous undertaking. The techniques for building a world are well established. Our focus now must be in refining the tools to be able to handle the ever-growing size of the datasets involved.

Q. What words of wisdom do you have for anyone interested in entering the world of 3D computer graphics?
A. One thing I've learned over the years is that I should not offer career advice!