Rising Stars: Meet Jason Diaz

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jason Diaz.

Hi Jason, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
From before I could remember, I had a pencil and paper in my hands. Art was in my DNA and all the way through high school, and I was always drawing, all the way through high school. With a lot of help from my HS art teacher, I was able to land a scholarship to Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, and then another scholarship to Savannah College of Art and Design.

After double majoring for a couple of years in Illustration and 3d Art, I was about to drop 3d Art because I wasn’t doing as well, and my animation professor encouraged me to stick out the semester as we were moving into character animation. It was after we started character animation that I found my passion, and I ended up dropping my Illustration track.

Several years after graduation, in 2004 an opportunity in video games opened up, which hadn’t been considered as a career path. That role led me and my family to California to stay. I have been blessed and fortunate in my career to have worked at major studios for Activision, Microsoft, and Ubisoft. I have been a part of major titles and great projects in Transformers, Call of Duty, Destiny 2, the upcoming Avatar game, and The Outer Worlds 2.

I am currently the Animation Director of Story & Cinematics for North America, focusing on a new journey of my animation career, deviating from gameplay animation. With the state of the current tech and game engines, my current role is allowing for me to amplify and explore the nuances of how animation can evoke emotions and story beats in games, and I am excited for the future.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
This road has definitely not been smooth. The film and video game industry, despite how successful they both may seem, are notorious for mass layoffs. We are in flux right now as an industry. I have experienced being laid off three times in my career before breaking into games; I have been very blessed and fortunate to have survived several mass layoffs within video game development.

Working towards career advancement has had challenges as well. Timing and studio have a large hand in that, and I have been able to work on some major projects that have allowed for me to have major contributions, learn, grow, and become better.

Besides jumping from project to project, video game development is in a perpetual state of evolving technology. What is new today is old tomorrow. Having to constantly keep up with the change and demand for more and better technology, leads to more immersive experiences, and equally keeps developers on their toes, requiring us to constantly learn towards creating more complex interactive games.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
As an animator by practice and craft, I like to explain to people that I am a digital puppetmaster. Most people seem to understand that visualization. Think of Pinocchio and all of the strings that pull his arms and legs. In 3d software, we have what we call “control rigs”, which virtually allow for animators to manipulate and pose characters over time, to make believable performances. This is what we call keyframed animation, where the animator is responsible to create motion from beginning to end.

Another source of animation is motion capture, also known as “mocap”. This method takes advantage of real-life performances by actors in spandex suits. Reflective balls are strategically and anatomically placed on actors and recorded by special cameras. That data is processed and given to animators to enhance, edit, and push for the best performances possible. This method can also include facial capture via helmet-mounted cameras and married to the body capture for a full virtual character performance.

The nuance and study of motion, timing, weight, and body language lead to believable performances that animators will tediously work out and pour into their work. This can take multiple tries to hone in on the right performance that will evoke emotional responses from users and viewers.

I have used both methods in my career and am very proud of the work I have done and directed. Working on real-life-based games, like Call of Duty (Advanced Warfare & Modern Warfare) leaned heavily on mocap, while work on Transformers and Destiny 2 were more keyframe created. I have enjoyed working with both methods of animation, and they both have their advantages but should complement each other.

We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
In production, there is always risk against the schedule, resources, and budget. I would say that each of those has an effect on the other. Early in my management path, as a Lead Animator, I decided not to use any of the original animation work when starting to produce a Transformers game sequel. I felt we could hit a higher quality bar and did use the original work as a baseline to stand up the sequel as a playable game right off the bat. This allowed for my team to replace animations “under the hood” and on schedule so that not one area of the game was broken or unusable.

As a director, manager, or any type of team lead, there is no way around risk. If you have no risk, you won’t run into adversity. If you have no adversity, then you won’t be pushed through the fire to produce compelling and inspiring work. So to some degree, I have to be a risk taker, but it is always weighted against the resources or team size, you have as well as the timeline given for project completion. It’s my responsibility in my role to find ways to cut corners so that we can create efficiently and maximize the talent and production of the team I have.

Contact Info:

• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-diaz-27292b/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1xBBnUbtpU