We’re excited to announce the addition of Isaac Gierard to Stimulant’s technical team! Isaac brings a wealth of experience in engineering site-specific installations across a variety of technologies, and is always up for learning more. Welcome, Isaac!
Can you share a bit about your background?
I've had a fairly evolving career path. I started out as a web developer at a small web marketing agency in Pittsburgh. Through connections in the flash world wound up in a game developer role at Silver Tree Media working with major game publishers such as EA and Disney. During that time I also got involved in Pittsburgh maker movement, which got me into building real physical things. When an opportunity to move to California to work for a social/mobile games company I took it. There I really expanded my scope of development including developing projects at scale and low level graphics programing. Wanting to get back into a project based business and work with a more diverse technology stack I joined JUXT in 2013. Now I'm super excited to bring my diverse skill set to Stimulant.
What drew you to Stimulant?
While working at JUXT I really got hooked on building experiences that inhabit a space. I've worked on many projects that have been locked into a traditional PC screen, mobile phone, or tablets. But when I got the opportunity to work on larger format displays and unique input methods the impact of these experiences was just so much more exciting. These enveloping immersive experiences are the kind of thing that Stimulant specializes in. Additionally these experiences are technically challenging and I feel Stimulant will really grow my technical toolbox.
Can you share something about yourself that not everyone knows?
In the past two years I've taken up Lindy Hop (a type of swing) and Blues dancing. Initially this was a way to connect with my girlfriend but expanded into an enjoyable personal pastime and a part of an exercise routine. The community around these dances have been very friendly and welcoming, and I've made several new friends.
What technologies and tools are you excited about these days?
I'm pretty interested in VR. It's in a period of discovery right now. There is a lot of work to do to figure out all of the paradigms for interaction in VR. No one seems to have a solid grip on what works best or if there even are singular best practices for everything.
I'm also pretty excited about how game engines such as Unity and Unreal can be used in interactive and installation contexts. These tools allow for much fast iteration and high visual fidelity (particularly when working in 3D).
