[MUSIC PLAYING]
LISETTE TITRE-MONTGOMERY: Hello, everyone.
So I'm the art manager at Ubisoft San Francisco,
and I've been a game developer for over 16 years.
So my journey to tech is a little different.
I didn't start in computer science,
but I was drawn to tech through my love of art.
As a young child, I was always drawing.
In fact, I used to get in trouble
all the time for drawing in the back of the Bible in church.
And I was always looking for a medium
that I could find my self-expression in.
So in high school I was taking drawing, painting, photography,
pretty much anything I could get my hands on.
But it wasn't until I saw "Toy Story,"
and that's when it all clicked.
It was a mix of left brain and right brain.
I was always a really strong student.
However, I was always looking for something a little bit more
challenging than just traditional art.
Shortly after seeing "Toy Story,"
I found my bachelor's program, and I graduated with a degree
in computer animation.
And I quickly realized that I was not
going to find the job I wanted in Florida,
so I packed up my suitcases and the workstation
I built by myself, and I moved to California.
And I was very fortunate that I got my first job
working in games.
So Freekstyle was a motocross game.
And it is, essentially, you are riding
on these very over-the-top tracks,
and you're also trying to, essentially, race other racers.
The big challenge with this was it was my first game.
So my school training trained me for film,
but it did not train me for game engines.
So I had to really learn how to get all of my art and content
into the game.
So that was a big challenge, but I
think I really fell in love with all the technical challenges
that were involved in it.
So I realized after shipping Freekstyle,
that if I was going to really make games
I needed to go the best place to do it at the time.
And that was EA.
So I got hired as a senior artist at EA,
and my first game was Tiger Woods 2006.
It was also a launch title for the PS3
and the 360, which means we kind of knew what the specs were,
but we didn't have final hardware.
And we had to figure all this out in time to launch.
So a lot of the challenges with Tiger Woods
was trying to figure out how to get clothing
to animate without having dynamic cloth simulation,
and also how to make realistic African-American skin
and hair with all of the new processing and power we
had with the new technology.
So I really focused on trying to make Tiger Woods's skin
look great.
And I even went as far as to go to the weave shop,
buy weaves and braids, and scan them
in so that we had accurate representation
of African-American hair.
After Tiger Woods was the Simpsons.
So the big challenge with the Simpsons
is that we were working on a 2D show on a 3D game.
So we had a 3D open world space and we
need it to feel like the town of Springfield.
And we especially needed the characters to stay on model.
So for example, Lisa, that you see here,
she needed to look exactly like she
would in the show at any possible model, and any angle
that the camera could-- that the user could set the camera.
So I literally spent a [INAUDIBLE]
shaping Lisa's hair from every possible camera angle
that the user could place it.
So it was a huge challenge, but it was a very well-received
product.
So my next challenge was Dante's Inferno.
And Dante's Inferno, just like the classic story,
is based on hell.
So you're journeying through the nine different circles of hell
through this game.
And working on this game kind of felt like that.
[LAUGHTER]
This was the first time we use distributed development.
So this was 2008 at the time.
So we didn't have Slack, we didn't have Skype,
we didn't have video chatting.
It was me working with a team in China over email,
and trying to tell a team of artists what they needed to do
to get the game in the engine.
So it was a huge challenge.
And we were also trying to get all this content in the game
with a smaller team.
So I had to learn how to do lighting and special effects
and get all this content in the game.
And it came out very well.
It was well-received.
And it was one of the first games
to actually get a Super Bowl commercial.
So after shipping Dante's, I decided
I wanted to work at a different studio,
so I went to Backbone Entertainment.
And Backbone Entertainment had a relationship with Harmonics.
And Harmonics develops Dance Central 3.
So the big challenge with Dance Central 3
was actually designing a game for players who are in motion.
So you use the Kinect in order to execute the moves
that you do onstage.
So while you're in motion, you have
to figure out where you are, whether you're
executing the moves properly, and also
whether you are scoring up.
So we had to develop technical ways and visual ways
to communicate to the player.
So something as simple as a character's texture
on their clothing, if it was too small, it would be blurry,
and it could literally make a player miss the beat.
We also had to find ways to communicate to the player
that they were doing well.
And we couldn't rely on our usual techniques,
which is a small button at the bottom or a health bar.
So we literally designed the environments to give feedback.
So as you are doing well, the world would light up,
and the whole scene would function like an equalizer.
So we had to use very, very unique design challenges
and use those techniques to communicate to the player.
So my current challenge is South Park.
I'm working on the next sequel to South Park
called South Park, the Fractured Butthole.
[LAUGHTER]
And our challenge with this product
is actually eliciting an involuntary response
from the player, which is laughter.
How do you use game mechanics to make someone laugh?
And that's our big challenge for this product,
and we're having a great time doing it.
So along my journey as a developer over 16 years,
it's been very apparent to me there are not enough people
of color in the industry.
And I was always a little bewildered about this.
And it wasn't until I got the cover of "Black Enterprise"
that I started to understand the answer.
I got letters from all over the country,
from parents and children wanting
to know, my child loves games, I want them to get interested
in technology.
How can I use this?
How can we leverage this?
To, I didn't think black women made games.
I didn't think that was possible.
So it became very apparent to me that I
needed to start speaking out about what I did.
So the first thing I started doing
was going out and volunteering and doing career conferences,
and also doing career days at school.
So these are the students from the Meadowood Livingston
school in San Francisco.
It's one of the only African-American-focused
schools in San Francisco that's publicly funded.
Shortly after that, word got out that there
was a black female game developer willing to speak,
and I started getting contacted by nonprofits.
One of the first nonprofits to reach out to me
was Black Girls Code.
And at the time, Kimberly Bryant was just
a small after-school program in the Bayview.
So I went out and I spoke, and sort of shared my experiences
as a game developer, and I still continue
to volunteer with Black Girls Code.
They're actually doing a hackathon
in the next few months and they're really
looking for volunteers.
So shortly after Black Girls Code,
I got contacted by Youth Uprising.
Youth Uprising is a community center in East Oakland,
and they provide a safe space for students
to learn technology, music, arts.
And the goal of Youth Uprising was
for them to reach out to me and my organization at the time,
Blacks In Gaming.
So I worked with Youth Uprising on coming up
with an after-school program, an eight-week program,
where we can train students on game development
and coding skills.
And that program was recognized by Governor Jerry Brown.
My current passion project is Gameheads Oakland.
So Gameheads Oakland was founded by Damon Packwood.
He actually just won an Echoing Green fellowship
for the program that we're working on.
And we volunteer and work with students 15 to 24
on game development skills and coding skills.
One of the great things about this program
is that I tap my network of game developers
and we bring them in and provide mentorship
to every single student, and this entire program is free.
We're also looking for volunteers.
[APPLAUSE]
So I was very honored to be invited to the White House
this August to participate in an LGBTQ program.
And what we were doing was brainstorming
on solutions and technology to improve inclusivity
in tech hiring.
So I was honored to meet Megan Smith, the former CTO
of the United States.
And we were able to spend a day in the White House
and really think about ways we can make tech more inclusive.
So if you want to know more about what I do,
you can reach me at my website lisettetitre.com.
and you can also find me on Twitter at zette16@gmail.com,
and please reach out to the orgs,
and the many orgs you'll hear about today, with some
of your time in volunteering.
Those organizations really need your technology experience.
And just seeing more women and women of color
will let the next generation know what is possible.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
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