Christopher Cotton             Level Designer

c_a_cotton@hotmail.com                                                                                                  (512) 554-8145
http://students.guildhall.smu.edu/~cottonc        6600 Preston Road, Apt. 2324, Plano, TX 75024

Skills

Level Design:
- BSP based building
- Tile-set based building
- Terrain generation
- Entity utilization
- Audio usage
- Static mesh placement
- Texturing
- Lightings
- Optimization
- Scripting of events and AI
- Documentation of game and level designs
 

Editors:
- Unreal 3.0 (Brothers in Arms: Hell’s Highway)
- Unreal 2.5 (Unreal Tournament 2004)
- Quake 4 Radiant
- Quake 3 Radiant
- Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind Construction Set
- Aurora Neverwinter Nights Toolset
- Scrolling Game Development Kit


3-D Modeling/Animation/Texturing:

- 3D Studio Max 8
                   - Low and medium polygon modeling
                   - UVW Unwrapping
                   - Normal Mapping
                   - Scene lighting
                   - Key-frame animation
                   - Scene assimilation
                   - Rendering
- Adobe Creative Suite CS2 (Photoshop, Illustrator, Image Ready):
                   - Texture creation
                   - Image editing
                   - Sprite creation
                   - Montage creation


Related Skills:
- Scripting Languages: C++, Visual Basic
- Source control: Tortoise SVN, Subversion, Perforce
- Microsoft Office 2003 Suite, Project, FrontPage
- Traditional Fine Arts: drawing, painting, photography
- Storytelling and creative writing
- Theatre set design
- Audio recording and editing (Sony Sound Forge, Audacity)


Game Creation Experience

Brothers in Arms: Hell’s Highway - Gearbox Software

July – September 2006
Level Designer (Intern)
- Worked with a team of six level designers, four programmers, and three artists
- Designed layout and setting of a multiplayer prototype map
- Built a BSP block-out of map
- Built map using BSP structures, static mesh placement, lighting, texturing, and terrain generation
- Tested prototype multiplayer levels in a professional testing environment


Toybox Heroes (Multiplayer Half-Life 2 Team Project) - The Guildhall at SMU

October 2006 – March 2007
Lead Level Designer (Faculty Selected Position)
- Worked with a team of seven level designers, five programmers, and three artists
- Designed 5+ major gameplay elements for the levels of the game
- Reviewed and revised the layouts of the levels of the game
- Reviewed and revised level documentation
- Created a random item spawner with the help of programmers and artists
- Scripted and implemented moving drawers for the dollhouse level
- Created detailed BSP structures for the dollhouse level
- Modeled, unwrapped and textured 15+ assets for the game
- Created task lists and schedules for the level design team with the help of the producer

Dangerball ’77 (Multiplayer Unreal Tournament 2004 Project) - The Guildhall at SMU

January - March 2006
Level Designer
- Worked with a team of five level designers, four programmers, and two artists
- Created level block-out for a mall level with the assistance of other level designers
- Created detailed BSP structures for a mall and warehouse level
- Scripted moving animations for art assets in a disco and warehouse level
- Scripted an animated disco floor texture for a disco level
- Lighting for a disco and mall level
- Modeled, unwrapped and textured 20+ assets for the game
- Created 15+ environmental textures for the game

Rescue Mission (Single-player Half-Life 2 Level) - The Guildhall at SMU

October 2006 – March 2007
Level Designer
- Designed layout and setting of the map
- Created a BSP block-out of the map
- Built map using creation of BSP structures, static mesh placement, lighting, texturing, and optimization
- Scripting of events and enemy AI
- Created level documentation


Detour (Single-player Quake 4 Level) - The Guildhall at SMU

April – June 2006
Level Designer
- Designed layout and setting of the map
- Created a BSP block-out of the map
- Built map using creation of BSP structures, static mesh placement, lighting, texturing, and optimization
- Scripted events and enemy AI
- Created level documentation


Myni Adventures (Scrolling Game Development Kit Game) - The Guildhall at SMU

July – September 2005
Level Designer/ Artist
- Designed game layout, setting, and gameplay mechanics
- Scripted gameplay events
- Created and implemented 200+ environmental texture tiles
- Created and implemented 10+ animated sprites
- Created and implemented sound effects


Game-Related Experience

Gamestop Retail Outlet

August 2004 – June 2005
Sales Associate
- Worked with people providing customer assistance and sales

“The Morrowind Visual Pack” for The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind
- Created environmental textures

“The Morrowind Voice Add-on Project” for The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind
- Edited voice-over audio clips and did voice acting for the Dagoth Gares character

Experience with other forms of gaming
- Have played tabletop board games , tabletop miniatures games, pen and paper role-playing games, and card games

Education
 

The Guildhall at SMU

March 2007
Certificate in Digital Game Development, specialization in Level Design