This week on 8111, Euan Macdonald! Euan grew up near Edinburgh, Scotland the middle brother of three. His father was an architect and also loved cartooning. His mother taught yoga and wrangled the three boys. They had a ZX Spectrum computer in the house growing up and Euan played games and did some rudimentary programming. He worked to help his dad on projects mapping structured space and experimented with making videos from image sequences generated on the computer.
In school he was excited to pursue animation and computer graphics. After school Euan went to work in London at a company called Digital Pictures. He also got am opportunity to attend SIGGRAPH 1990 in Dallas as a student volunteer. He continued building his skills and his reel which landed him a full-time job at Industrial Light and Magic as a Technical Director.
At ILM Euan worked on numerous films including; In the Mouth of Madness, The Mask, Disclosure, The Lost World, Dragonheart, Episode 1, Harry Potter 3, and several others. Euan's skillset quickly landed him in the role of CG Supervisor. He had a fun experience on Dragonheart where he met fellow Scotsman, Sean Connery. When the film premiered in the UK Euan got to hang out with Connery and introduce his parents to the original 007.
After more than a decade at ILM it was time for a change of pace and Euan headed to Vancouver to work at Electronic Arts. The transition to games was exciting and challenging. He continued to build new skills and expanding his roles with each move. Sometime later he returned to Marin to help set up the new studio at Image Movers Digital and worked for a time at The Orphanage.
Today Euan works for himself on multiple exciting start ups. His ventures have included developing creative toys, mobile AR applications, games, VR, NFTs, and original content. Euan's drive, enthusiasm, and creativity have kept him always busy with new ideas, new projects, and new opportunities. It was so much fun chatting with Euan about this life and career.
