Hobbies

From a young age, I had a strong inclination towards puzzles and gaming. I was four years old when I first started learning chess after I got transfixed with a computer game called Fritz and Chesster whilst playing on an iMac in the local Apple store, I begged my mum to buy me the game - luckily, she agreed and my gaming journey thus began.

As I grew older, I became increasingly proficient in problem-solving. I learned how to solve sudoku and started building my collection of Rubik's cubes (a collection that is still growing, even today). Additionally, my love of sports started young with me dragging my parents to my Sunday league football games just to watch us lose on most occasions. I wouldn't say I was ever very good at football, however, I loved being a part of a team and working towards a common goal.

Nowadays I don't particularly play many sports except for fun on occasion. However, I have a newfound love for running, having started in November of last year, just a month later I finished my first half marathon, admittedly with a rather unimpressive time of 2 hours 11 minutes, but I'm proud I managed to finish and I am now looking forward to improving my time later on this year.

Video Games have been ever-present in my life. I still remember the day my dad brought home our PlayStation 3 or when the Nintendo Wii was released and my whole family was making their Mii's so we could play Wii Sports together. These early memories led to me buying my first desktop computer and playing games like Diablo 3 and World of Warcraft throughout my teenage years. I have a special place in my heart for video games, though I do spend a bit too much time on them at the weekends.

Another part of my daily routine is reading fiction. I mainly read Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Manga, however, I do like to add in some classics when I am in between series. Some of my favourite novels and series include the Red Rising series by Pierce Brown, the Foundation series by Isaac Asimov, The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, and 1984 by George Orwell.

Another side passion of mine is playing micro stakes poker. I am drawn to the probabilities involved and enjoy the gamesmanship of card games. After playing with play 'money' for years, slowly learning to play no-limit Texas Hold'em, I decided to invest with £30 of credit. I'm proud to announce this has made me a £6 profit! I think it's safe to say this won't be my next career move...

Education

In sixth form, I felt lost when thinking about my potential career path. I liked a broad range of topics from GCSE and I ended up taking three wildly different subjects at A-Level, Maths (A), Business (C), and Art (C). This felt right at the time as I assumed it would allow me to follow any path I wanted, yet by the end of my experience, I believe I had less of a clue of what I wanted to do as a career than I did at the beginning.

Ultimately, I decided to begin studying a Maths and Investment Banking course at the University of Reading. After only a few months, I knew the course wasn't for me. I decided to take a year out of education and work at a local print company. This was great because it gave me time to think about what I wanted to do as a career. Consequently, a few months into the job, I decided I wanted to return to university.

In September 2019 I started my Computer Science for Games course at the University of Brighton. I chose the course because I recalled how much I enjoyed completing my computing GCSE and simply because I was passionate about video games. My first two years at university flew by very quickly with the exception of the COVID-19 pandemic. I didn't struggle very much until my 3rd year. During this final year it felt like the difficulty of my assignments increased dramatically, yet, despite this, it was during this time that I felt I produced some of my best work due to my interest in the modules offered and my dissertation project.

My dissertation project centred on coding an Inventory System tailored for Modern RPGs. I utilised Unity and C# to develop the user interface for players to efficiently manage large amounts of in-game resources and items. I chose this as my dissertation project due to discovering that I enjoy creating User Interfaces during one of the modules in my degree. This project was particularly enjoyable due to having freedom over the direction the project could take. This allowed me to express myself through my work and incorporate elements that I was interested in. As a consequence of this, I could see myself specialising in UI or UX later on in my career.

The only JavaScript experience I had before applying for FAC came in the form of a game that I made for my web-based game development module. Nonetheless, this project didn't help develop my JavaScript skills or aid my FAC application because we were instructed to use the Phaser Game Engine. Although this was a great tool for game development, I believe it did a lot of the work for me. I am grateful for the learning opportunity that this application has offered me. Building a game from scratch in pure JavaScript has been a great learning experience and definitely put my skills to the test.

One of my favourite assignments during my degree was to create a multiplayer pong game. This used client-server architecture. I incorporated new power-ups into my rendition of the game that allowed for multiple ball entities to be in play at the same time. This is when I learned the difficulty of programming with concurrency in mind. This assignment was the first time I used two different programming languages in conjunction with each other - Java for the server side and C++ for the client side.

Another module I enjoyed was Data Structures and Operating Systems where I designed and programmed a hashtable in Java. The idea was to focus on fast and efficient data retrieval and manipulation of data through different types of sorting algorithms. Furthermore, for my game engine development module, my goal was to create an easily scalable achievement system in C++ that would apply to various types of video games. Along with this was a game demo I programmed to demonstrate the utility of the system.

• Finally after all my hard work, in July of 2022 I graduated with a 1st class BSc(Hons) Degree!

• For the Code of all my projects mentioned here GOTO the projects section of this website!

Post-Uni

I secured my first job post-university as an Assistant Installation Engineer at Absolute Digital Solutions designing and installing CCTV security systems. Despite being hired for a temporary six-month contract, this was continually extended due to my good teamwork and competency in the role. I enjoyed my time in the industry and accumulated masses of hands-on experience with computer networks but I knew that in the long term, my career goals were aimed at becoming a software developer. Hence, I parted ways with the company in the hope of more opportunities in the software development world.

Due to my curiosity and eagerness to keep learning, alongside my employment, I embarked on a freeCodeCamp course focusing on Responsive Web Design, an experience that I thoroughly enjoyed and which ultimately led me to create my portfolio website.

In my spare time, I have been experimenting with my own projects. I've also been working as a sound engineer for my brother's film production company to develop my skills and knowledge in additional areas. I was fortunate enough to be recommended FAC and after researching the program, I discovered it would be a perfect fit for me and my career aspirations. If given the opportunity, I trust Founders and Coders would support me to work collaboratively, advance my skills and allow me to have a positive impact on the industry as a whole.

• Responsive Web Design Developer Certification - freeCodeCamp

• My Portfolio Website - made with HTML, CSS & Bootstrap