PIPELINES · TOOLS · SHADERS · VFX
Vega / Xuan Bai
Senior Technical Artist
Bridging art and engineering through pipeline automation, tools development, real-time content workflows, and production-focused technical art.
- Industry experience
- 9 years
- Automated pipeline runs
- 500+
- Interactive projects
- 15+
- Artists using tools I built
- 20+
Selected Work
Production pipelines, tools, and real-time systems—followed by a focused selection of exploration projects.
PRODUCTION WORK
Game & Production Projects
Shipped game development, technical art pipelines, editor tools, and real-time production systems.
Out of Time
Manticore Games · 2026
Core-to-Unreal automation pipeline and large-scale mob rendering for a multiplayer rogue-lite
Impact
Artists kept Core's fast iteration while the runtime gained native UE performance. The pipeline became the performance foundation of Out of Time: ~50% fewer actors, ~90% fewer mob draw calls, and 200+ on-screen mobs at 30 FPS on Steam Deck.
n'Space Immersive Projection System
Archifiction Inc. · 2017
Content team building, five-surface projection rendering, and production pipelines for an immersive projection system
Impact
Established a reusable content production system for custom projection hardware, reducing new-project setup from one day to half an hour and supporting the delivery of 15+ commercial and exhibition projects. Shared asset libraries, a base plugin, and outsourcing guidelines enabled a six-person internal team and two outsourcing teams to work to common standards, freeing the internal team to explore new interactions and visual approaches.
UE Art Pipeline Tools
Manticore Games · 2020
Asset import, validation, and automation tooling on the Unreal side
Impact
Gave 20+ artists a UE-side tool layer they use daily, with import and setup collapsed into one click. 98 data-driven validation rules catch asset problems before they reach a build, bringing daily build errors from asset issues down to near zero.
DCC Tools / Pipeline
Manticore Games · 2020
Digital content creation tools and pipeline integrations
Impact
Standardized artist-facing DCC workflows, reduced manual export/setup work, and made pipeline tools easier for technical artists to maintain and extend.
EXPLORATIONS
Exploration Projects
Personal, student, and experimental work across games, AI, interactive tools, web development, and rapid prototyping.
WIPRoad Trip: Ahead One
Personal Project · 2026
A browser-based idle and companion game supported by art-directed procedural worlds and an AI-assisted 3D asset pipeline
Impact
Built and publicly released a playable road-trip game while developing a reusable approach to procedural art direction, AI-assisted asset integration, runtime diagnosis, and safe content iteration. Visual refinement and broader performance validation remain in progress.
AI Chat Avatar
Personal Project · 2023
Real-time conversational sales assistant with speech, viseme-driven lip sync, and character animation
Impact
Demonstrated a complete real-time conversational character workflow that unified cloud AI services with UE5 facial and body animation in a solo prototype.
WIPMy Gaming Room
Personal Project · 2026
From AI-generated models to interactive, simulation-ready 3D assets
Impact
Built a repeatable path from generated models to interactive and simulation assets, with every step checked against geometry quality, mechanical function, and measured contact. When an asset is replaced or the environment is extended, the impact can be judged directly against existing interfaces and validation results.
WIPCats by the Window
Personal Project · 2026
A webcam-driven hide-and-seek game connecting head-tracked perspective, tactile 3D art, and a Blender-to-Three.js content pipeline
Impact
Built a five-level interactive prototype that ties visual perception to playable spatial puzzles, with reusable scene and character workflows and checks against the same assets used in the game.
Skills & Technologies
Core competencies across technical art, engineering, and production
Tech-Art & Real-Time 3D
- Unreal Engine 5 & Unity
- Open World Setup
- Shaders & Materials
- Niagara/VFX & Lighting
- Procedural Generation
- Profiling & Optimization
- Technical Troubleshooting
DCC & 3D Content
- Blender, Maya, Houdini
- Substance Painter / Designer
- Photoshop & Illustrator
- Modeling & Texturing
- UV & Material Workflows
- Rigging & Animation
- GLB / FBX / USD Preparation
Programming
- C++, Python
- Blueprint, C#
- TypeScript & JavaScript
- PowerShell
- Lua, MEL
Tools & Pipeline
- Editor Tools & Plugins
- Asset Pipeline Management
- DCC-to-Engine Integration
- Batch Automation
- CI / Jenkins
- Perforce / Git / SVN
Production
- Agile Production
- Project Scoping & Planning
- Documentation & Standards
- Cross-Team Communication
- Outsourcing & Vendor Direction
- Technical Support & Triage