Hi, I'm David Lightbown.

I am currently User Experience Director at Ubisoft Montreal. Previously, I was Technical Director at Behaviour Interactive; Technical Artist at DC Studios (now Firebrand Games); 3D Artist at TVA; and Web Developer at OpenDesk (formerly HBE Software). My video game development credits can be found on MobyGames.

I wrote the book Designing the User Experience of Game Development Tools (now in its second edition), which you can learn more about at uxofgametools.com.

I have given talks at GDC (Game Developers Conference), CEDEC, SIGGRAPH, Devcom, FMX, MIGS (Montreal International Game Summit), and others. I also traveled across Japan, Germany, and Switzerland to speak about the Canadian games industry with Global Affairs Canada. You can see recordings of my presentations here: GDC Vault, YouTube. I was on the advisory board for MIGS at its inception and am currently a member of the GDC Advisory Board.

I wrote a series of articles titled Classic Tools Retrospectives for GameDeveloper.com (formerly Gamasutra.com), featuring interviews with John Romero about the TEd tile editor, Tim Sweeney on UnrealEd 1.0, the Deux Ex tools with Chris Norden, and the developers of the Gamebryo engine. I also worked with the GameDeveloper.com team on a variety of videos and articles.

In collaboration with Autodesk, I created a series of Maya Masterclasses, articles and podcasts, and authored the official Maya Training Manual for Game Development. Before it was acquired by Autodesk, I worked with Alias as a games industry speaker at events in Chicago, Seattle, and Vancouver. I also wrote reviews of Autodesk software for CG Channel, notably 3ds Max and Character Studio. In 2010, I received the Autodesk Master Award, which is given to the individual who has made the biggest impact on the Maya community.

I have volunteered with the IGDA as part of the Tools SIG (Special Interest Group) and mentored at Execution Labs, a video game incubator.

I am also a classically trained cellist, more recently performing jazz fusion and improvisational music. More on that at cellodavid.com.

I received a DEC in Communications and Media Studies from Dawson College, Lean Product Certification from McGill University, and studied Design Leadership and Visual Interface Design at Cooper.

You can find more details on LinkedIn.