My name is Jenni O’Connor, and this is a little about me. I’m a mom of two wonderful (now adult) children, Ryan and Catherine – they are the loves of my life, and endlessly fascinating. I’m a voracious reader and a lifetime learner. I enjoy cycling, hiking, and visiting new places. Beyond that is my career, and I’ll cover some of that in this Brief History of Time…
Elevator Summary
My current goals revolve around finding a new and challenging job. I’m looking for something that will utilize my strong background in development and 3d technology, and allow me to grow professionally. In the meantime, I’m working hard to fill knowledge and experience gaps in my areas of interest.
“See a need, fill a need!” is one of my favorite quotes from the movie “Robots” and it describes what I’ve always tried to do, at work and beyond. I enjoy learning and doing new things. I enjoy managing projects and getting things done through my own work and the work of others. I enjoy the Zen-like focus that writing or programming can bring, and I enjoy the social aspect of working with a team towards a common goal. I enjoy the big picture, and also the fine details – I want to know how things work.
In my professional working life, I’ve been: an electronics draftsperson, an electronics technician, a lead technician, an electronics department supervisor, an entrepreneur, a developer, an educator, a business owner, a published author, a digital director (3D/AR/VR), and a user experience designer/product owner. I’ve embraced continual technological disruption.
You’ll find that I am much more than the sum of my job descriptions, though. Within each of those titles is an array of skills I developed, along with each job providing new and unique experiences.
If you’d like to know more, check out my LinkedIn profile, and I’ve also highlighted a few of my favorite things here…
Computers and Programming
The first computer I bought was in 1981 – a TRS-80 Model I – and it was one of the best things ever did. That evening I stayed up all night learning and exploring the seemingly infinite possibilities of the machine. I was hooked. That first day started a journey of lifetime learning and doing in computer technology that continues today, and I trust it will never stop.
At the time, my day job was troubleshooting and maintaining electronic and electro-mechanical equipment, “mechatronics,” which gave me insight into hardware and real-world applications. Interfacing the computer with the outside world was pretty cool, and programming in assembly language was like speaking to TRON. As computers advanced, I embraced each new challenge. I expanded and improved the Model I, and created new, unique hardware and software. I continued to evolve my skills as PCs hit the scene, and I grew with each new OS, and as new computer languages and technologies emerged.
In the mid-1980’s I took on more responsibility as department lead and started to work on the new field of programmable logic controllers (PLCs) and motor drive systems. I learned Ladder Logic programming and was designing, building, troubleshooting and maintaining PLCs. Within a couple of years, I moved into management and took on the leadership of three electronics departments. I was a great time to “see a need, fill a need,” and innovate. I continued to develop computer and control applications with my teams while leading a myriad of new projects and ongoing maintenance and upgrades to systems.
The non-existent PLC diagnostics of the 1980’s lead me to design an expert system in C and PROLOG that provided a real-time GUI for machines, and helped troubleshoot problems using a knowledge base and inference engine. Although the initial promise of AI faded over the years, I’ve remained keenly interested in AI. Machine Learning, Knowledge Representation, and Natural Language Processing applications hold great interest for me, and I learn whatever I can.
In the 1990’s I added C++ to my repertoire. I built portable machines for real-time data collection and diagnostics, and over the years I developed multi-tasking networked applications that interfaced and controlled the real world. The world of programmable controls got faster and better, too, and we built new systems and upgraded the old.
In the 2000’s I added C# to my skillset. I continued to design hardware and develop software for unique systems, including C++ apps running in AutoCAD, and new generations of embedded diagnostics tools. In C#, I built distributed, multi-threaded, real-world applications, and it was fun.
As department supervisor, I enjoyed leading the design and engineering of industrial control systems, mechatronics, and theater sound and lighting systems (among many other things). I’ve always been hands-on whenever I could be, and I’m the kind of person that will be out there at 3 AM right at my team’s side, testing a system or helping to pull wire to get the job done on time.
I have always pushed the envelope of my capabilities and strived to learn and do more. Today I’m sharpening my C++ and C# skills, and I’m working on Machine Learning, IoT, and newer VR, AR, and Mixed-Reality applications with game engines.
CAD and 3D Technology
I began using AutoCAD in mid-1980’s, and that was the start of this “thread of Autodesk products” that has weaved throughout my career. I was an early adopter of 2D and 3D CAD technology, and have varying degrees of expertise in 3D Studio Max, Inventor, Revit, and Fusion 360, to name a few. 3ds Max, however, has been my passion as it filled an artistic and creative need in me, and I literally “wrote the book” on using Max and mental ray for design visualization.
After doing freelance work with 3DS Max for many years, I eventually started a company with my son doing design visualization full-time. We eventually incorporated as 4D Artists, Inc., and had a brick-and-mortar office in an industrial park for several years. In 2012, one of our largest clients decided to start a design viz studio in-house and essentially absorbed our company. This small division grew into a new business, Blue Marble 3D, and I directed their design viz, animation, and VR/AR efforts. At Blue Marble, we had deeper pockets and could work with bigger and faster systems, and on larger and more complex projects, primarily in retail, restaurants, and hospitality. We expanded into real-time VR workflows with an EON Reality virtual reality CAVE system and other 3D hardware. I left there and began working at Autodesk in 2014.
Teaching and Writing
I had a unique opportunity in the late 1990’s to teach a 16-session course in AutoCAD at the local college. I found that I enjoyed teaching and that it was quite a challenge. I enjoyed seeing people learn and grow, and helping them succeed. I jumped at the chance when the school wanted to add a class in 3ds Max. I developed new courses for both Intro and Advanced 3ds Max users and eventually took over other CAD classes from time to time.
In the 17 years as an adjunct professor I taught AutoCAD, 3ds Max, Design Visualization, Revit, Inventor, Fusion 360, and a little Computer Science. I stopped teaching when I started at Autodesk and moved to San Francisco, but I’m exploring teaching again.
I started a Chicago-area 3ds Max User’s Group in the mid-2000’s; I was eager to build a community to both share and learn about 3D technology and to support my career and business. As with most things in life, when you choose to give, you invariably get more in return. Through the User’s Group, I gave free all-day seminars on the mental ray renderer, which lead to a book deal for “Mastering mental ray” (Sybex 2010).
At the time which I wrote the book, I was also doing design viz full-time and teaching two classes in the evening. It was an incredible time of growth as an author and opened new opportunities for me in the future. The writing was challenging as I needed to write in the format the publisher needed and to tighten up my writing. I learned a lot, and still think about those lessons every time I write.
By the time the book was completed, I could easily whip-out a chapter in a week while also juggling the revisions of several other chapters. I generated almost 4 gigabytes of samples to go with the tutorials and found that creating interesting tutorials – things that were illustrative and also examples that almost anyone could accomplish – were the most challenging and time-consuming part of the production.
UX Design and Agile Development at Autodesk
Joining Autodesk in 2014 opened up a new world of opportunities for me, and numerous new challenges. I was a subject-matter expert for rendering and design data interop, and my job titles were Senior User Experience Designer and Agile Product Owner. I had a lot of responsibilities, a lot to learn, and a lot I could contribute to improvements in the product.
In the fall of 2013, before being hired, I had participated in a design charrette at Autodesk in Montreal and found that to be a fascinating and enjoyable process, and this leads to my interest in the position. One of the things that attracted me to the job was that I would be the voice of the user, and would work with the users to help to drive the direction of the product. I would help people do amazing things, and make their work-lives better.
As Product Owner, I worked with stakeholders (management and users) and the dev teams to define priorities, make stories and estimates, and organize the backlog. I worked with customers on our beta program and in the outside world to help define the goals and validate the designs and operation of the feature. As Product Designer, I worked with stakeholders to develop new workflows, generated mockups of concepts to help explain and generate discussions on the designs, and write specification and acceptance criteria. As things were developed, I worked with users to help validate the designs, and drive changes as needed in our agile process.
At Autodesk, I traveled to places I would never have imagined I would go. Warsaw Poland. Sofia Bulgaria. Berlin Germany. Gothenburg Sweden, London England, Manchester England, Singapore, Toronto, and Montreal, Canada. I spoke at SIGGRAPH on cloud computing, and again on our (then) current project, the new Arnold renderer integration for 3ds Max. I went to Kathmandu, Nepal, for pro bono work through the Autodesk Foundation.
For the Kathmandu trip, I was on a pro-bono trip sponsored by Autodesk and working with Build Change. My team was using human-centered design techniques to come up with requirements and direction for a Dynamo Revit project, then creating Revit templates and an app. The goal was to give them tools to speed and improve the evaluating and design of earthquake-resistant homes. It was an amazing experience, and the Dynamo app was a huge success.
Through Autodesk, I got training on human-centered design (LUMA) and Pragmatic Marketing. In working with my fellow designers, and in my own initiatives, I learned a tremendous amount about UX and interaction design.
In the time I was at Autodesk, the rendering team and I integrated three new renderers into 3ds Max: the A360 cloud renderer, the Autodesk Ray Tracer (ART), and the Arnold render. I worked with our Shanghai and Montreal teams on improvements to Revit and Inventor interop, and on the new Scene Converter. I did a lot of QA work as features as they were being developed help to ensure they worked as expected, and worked well.
In addition to rendering, I worked with the research group in Montreal on machine learning and point cloud initiatives, among other interesting things. I’ve worked on cloud-integrated features for rendering and design data. A lot of things I designed or worked I can’t share as they haven’t made it into Max, yet. It will be interesting to see how Max evolves in the coming years.
After nearly four years, Autodesk and I parted ways after they reorganized and eliminated my position. I had a lot going on work-wise at the time – I had my fingers in a number of pies – and a lot that I still wanted to learn and accomplish. That is life, and I’m grateful for the time, the training, and the experience, and thankful for having so many interesting and engaging things to work on. Now I’m looking at what to do in my next chapter, and evaluating skills, looking at skill gaps, and seeing what the world has to offer.
Being at Autodesk was a rich and rewarding experience, and I leave there with a grateful heart.
You Made It This Far!
Excellent, thanks!
I’ve spent time these past few years working on my C++ and C# skills, and learning about the latest in agile and general program development like Clean Coding, working with legacy code, and SOLID principals. I’m working on learning Unreal Engine in detail for design visualization and VR applications, I want to use my programming skills to expand UE’s capabilities and make cool things. It is an exciting time to be in technology, and new and interesting possibilities await.