5 7 2 6 L A S A I N E AV E . ENCINO, CA 91316 TEL + 1 3 1 7 7 5 2 - 2 3 3 3 EMAIL A L E K A M C A @ G M A I L . C O M HTTP://SITES.GOOGLE.COM/SITE/ALEKAMCADAMS/

Aleka McAdams RESEARCH

Physical simulation, rendering, and parallel computing for computer graphics: hair, cloth, fluid and deformable object simulation, ray-tracing and global illumination. EXPERIENCE S E N I O R S O F T W A R E E N G I N E E R , W A LT D I S N E Y A N I M AT I O N S T U D I O S ; B U R B A N K , C A J U LY 2 0 1 1 -

PRESENT

Software engineer for look, effects, and dynamics. Develops software for dynamics and rendering, with interests in optimization. G R A D U AT E A S S O C I AT E , W A LT D I S N E Y A N I M AT I O N S T U D I O S ; B U R B A N K , C A F A L L 2 0 1 0 - 2 0 1 1

Developing a Maya plugin with finite element-based, CUDA-accelerated deformable object simulation for physically based skinning with collision object and self collision resolution. RESEARCH

AND

D E V E L O P M E N T I N T E R N , W E TA D I G I TA L ; W E L L I N G T O N , N E W Z E A L A N D F A L L 2 0 0 9

Developed Maya plugins for CUDA-accelerated hair simulation. Prototyped an SMP multigrid preconditioned conjugate gradient Poisson solver for irregular domains. ACADEMIC MENTOR, UCLA; LOS ANGELES, CA

SUMMER

2009

Mentored a team of undergraduate students as a part of the Research in Industrial Projects for Students (RIPS) summer research program at the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics. Oversaw student progress and provided academic direction and support. T E A C H I N G A S S O C I AT E

FOR

M AT H E M AT I C S D E P A R T M E N T , U C L A ; L O S A N G E L E S , C A 2 0 0 6 - 2 0 0 9

Led discussion sessions to review and explain key concepts and assist with homework and exam preparation. Graded homework and exams and provided feedback to the students. Prepared and led exam review sessions and held office hours to assist students one-on-one. G R A D U AT E A S S O C I AT E , W A LT D I S N E Y A N I M AT I O N S T U D I O S ; B U R B A N K , C A

SUMMER

2008

Prototyped a volumetric hair simulation plugin for Maya. Developed Maya plugins to assist with fluid simulation and visualization. S O F T W A R E E N G I N E E R , T H E A E R O S P A C E C O R P O R AT I O N ; E L S E G U N D O , C A

SUMMER

2007

Developed software reliability testing models for satellite systems and analyzed reliability test data. E D U C AT I O N UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - LOS ANGELES, CA

Master of Arts in Mathematics, December 2007 Ph.D. in Mathematics, June 2011 DEPAUW UNIVERSITY, GREENCASTLE, IN

Bachelor of Arts (summa cum laude), June 2006 P U B L I C AT I O N S

“Efficient elasticity for character skinning with contact and collisions,” A. McAdams, Y. Zhu, A. Selle, M. Empey, R. Tamstorf, J. Teran, E. Sifakis, ACM Trans. Graph. (SIGGRAPH Proc.), 2011. “A parallel multigrid Poisson solver for fluids simulation on large grids,” A. McAdams, E. Sifakis, and J. Teran, Proc. of the 2010 ACM SIGGRAPH/Eurographics Symp. on Comp. Anim., 2010. Source code available at http://code.google.com/p/mgpcg-poisson/ “Detail Preserving Continuum Simulation of Straight Hair”, A. McAdams, A. Selle, K. Ward, E. Sifakis, and J. Teran, ACM Trans. Graph. (SIGGRAPH Proc.), 2009. SKILLS

Solid foundation in computational mathematics including research and coursework in ODEs and PDEs, computational fluid dynamics, continuum mechanics, optimization, image processing, numerical integration, and numerical linear algebra. Strong C++ skills and significant work experience with Maya API and prman. Proficient in CUDA and CPU parallel computing. Familiar with Java, Matlab and scripting with Python, bash, csh.