Chapter President – Henry LaBounta

Henry recently joined Microsoft Studios after almost 10 years at EA where he started in games as a Senior Art Director on “SSX3″. Most recently he was Senior Art Director on “Need for Speed Hot Pursuit” at Criterion Games. Henry’s has worked on many games including “Skate”, “Skate 2″, “NBA Street”, “Need for Speed Hot Pursuit 2″, “Need for Speed Most Wanted”, “Burnout Paradise” and many EA Sports Games where he held the role of Chief Visual Officer. Henry also previously held the role of Vancouver ACM SIGGRAPH Vice President where he was very active in both the chapter and the SPARK FX events.

Henry started his career in New York doing CG work for commercials and television before moving to film visual effects and feature animation. At PDI/DreamWorks Henry was Visual Effects Supervisor for the Steven Spielberg films “Minority Report” and “A.I.”. His filmography includes “Mission Impossible 2″, “The Prince of Egypt” and at Industrial Light & Magic ”Star Trek VII Generations”, “Casper” and “Twister” for which he won a BAFTA and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects

Chapter Vice-President – Jason Dowdeswell

Jason Dowdeswell heads Digital Domain’s feature film production, talent and teams in Vancouver. He joined the company in 2012. Prior to Digital Domain Jason spent two years as Head of Studio at Vancouver-based Image Engine where he oversaw visual effects production on films including The Thing and Neil Blomkamp’s Elysium. Prior to that he spent eight years at CIS-Vancouver (now Deluxe) as head of studio, and has also worked at Sony Pictures Imageworks, ILM and Boss Films, where he got his start in visual effects in 1993. Jason has been involved in the production of visual effects for features including Salt, Zombieland, Twilight, Night at the Museum, The DaVinci Code, Men in Black II, Star Wars: Episode II, True Lies and many others.

Treasurer - Chris Wren

Chris Wren is a 10 year veteran of Electronic Arts beginning his tenure as a Development Director for Sports and Action titles. Chris moved on to join EA University to head the Graphics Training track in delivering workshops and training programs to EA studios. Most recently Chris joined EA’s XDev team as Worldwide External Development Manager supporting distributed development for the organization. Prior to EA Chris performed as a Project Manager at Blast Radius, managing global client relations in digital marketing. Chris is the proud father of a new baby girl, and can often be found ski touring and mountain biking on Vancouver’s North Shore.

Chapter Past President - Glenn Entis

Glenn Entis is a pioneer of computer graphics and digital media with over 30 years of experience in some of the leading companies in the industry. Before co-founding VanEdge Capital, Glenn was Senior Vice-president / Chief Visual and Technical Officer of Electronic Arts’ Worldwide Studios, leading EA’s 3000 artists and engineers across EA’s 14 studios worldwide. Prior to joining EA in 2000, Mr. Entis was the first and only CEO of DreamWorks Interactive, where he worked closely with Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg and oversaw the development of the first titles in the hit Medal of Honor series. DreamWorks Interactive, a joint venture of DreamWorks SKG and Microsoft, was purchased by Electronic Arts in 2000, and Mr. Entis remained with the studio to become the first General Manager of the newly re-christened EALA.

Prior to DreamWorks Interactive, Mr. Entis was a co-founder (and VP/COO) of the pioneering computer animation studio Pacific Data Images (PDI), guiding that studio’s growth from its inception as a computer animation studio in 1982 until he left for the games industry in 1994. PDI was one of the first successful computer animation studios, and in fact thrived through a time that saw the collapse of all of its major competitors. PDI remained independent until DreamWorks Animation acquired a minority share in 1996, followed up by full acquisition in 2000. In partnership with DreamWorks Animation, PDI produced the hit films Antz, Shrek & Madagascar (all films in the series), and it continues to thrive with over 500 employees.

Mr. Entis is a graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Art (with Honors) and a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy. After graduation he studied computer graphics under the legendary Dr. Ed Catmull at what was then the center of the CG world, New York Institute of Technology. He has worked as a software engineer at Hewlett Packard and Ampex prior to co-founding Pacific Data Images, and in 1998 he received the Technical Achievement Award from the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts (Academy Award) for his design and implementation of PDI’s animation software.

Mr. Entis is an active leader in the computer graphics community worldwide. He was the featured keynote presenter at SIGGRAPH 2007, and continues to be in heavy demand as a keynote presenter at computer graphics conferences, including France, Germany, Italy, Monaco, London, San Diego, Montreal and Vancouver. He is a former Chair of the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, is currently President of the Vancouver chapter of ACM SIGGRAPH (the world’s most active chapter), is a member of the Board of Governors of Emily Carr University, and is an Advisory Board member for the Great Northern Way Digital Media Program in Vancouver.