Meet the Magnopians: Gregg Bond
Magnopus is a diverse team of artists, designers, and engineers with studios in the US and UK. We create, deploy, and operate, cross-reality experiences at scale. In this series, you’ll get to know each and every one of us!
This week we caught up with Gregg Bond to hear about his role as an Unreal Engine Programmer, what inspires him, and his plan for surviving a zombie apocalypse.
Over the years, Gregg has certainly had what is best described as a non-linear career trajectory. He started out as an IT Engineer installing and managing servers and networks with a multiplayer game service provider, then moved over to live video production and systems integration, running events and building broadcast studios around the world. Eight years ago, he joined REWIND, as a Creative Technologist for “Special Projects”, where he built prototypes like the Warhammer 40,000 Powerfist for Sega and worked on events like the Jaguar I-Pace launch in VR. Two years ago, Gregg was offered the opportunity to add UE4 Programmer to his roster of skills and that has led him to where he is today at Magnopus, contributing to Weavr Studios and laying the foundations for the next immersive web.
What do you do at Magnopus at the moment?
Currently, my role is Unreal Engine Programmer, but I tend to wear many hats (this is the most recent among them). With the events of the last couple of years, the landscape has changed and my focus has moved from activations with physical installations, to software with a collaborative focus. I’ve retrained into development full-time so this feels a little like my third career. I am truly grateful that Magnopus has been so supportive in allowing me to switch roles.
What is one app or software you couldn’t do your job without?
I would say Slack. It’s kept me connected with the team, it’s allowed easy communication, and it’s kept me sane! It’s the foundation of how I work from day-to-day, and I don’t know what I’d do without it. Magnopus has the balance between work and informal channels just right, for example, we have a ‘Magnopets’ channel (where everyone shares pictures of their furry friends) and a Wordle channel that helps to keep the brain sharp (along with the morning coffee!)
What made you decide to pursue a career in this field?
Way back, when I started my career, I was in IT and computer science—fixing networks, that sort of stuff. I fell in love with broadcasting, which at the time in the early 2000s, was moving away from traditional analogue systems to computer-controlled systems. I had an opportunity to move into that as a career and jumped at the chance. I’ve always loved solving problems, and some of the coolest problems come out of this entertainment/interactivity blend that Magnopus is basically all-in on.
In this industry, there’s very little in the way of people ahead of you. It’s not necessarily cutting edge anymore, but from a technology standpoint, it’s all about new and novel ways of taking the Lego bricks of the industry and going, hey, spaceship!
What three skills are essential for anyone in your role?
First of all, in my role, you’ve got to approach challenges correctly. You have to know how to break problems down into bits that make sense and are manageable otherwise, you’re trying to wrestle the 500-pound bear in one go. That, I think, is a skill in and of itself. That skill is difficult to teach someone because it’s essentially a fundamental difference in how the brain works. Conveniently, that’s how mine works, so it’s helped me extremely well over the years.
Secondly, being able to accept criticism is a big one. We practice ‘no egos’ here at Magnopus, if there’s a better approach to something and someone has given you a nudge in the right direction, you have to accept that it’s best for the project and move onwards. You’ve got to be open to other people’s opinions and experiences, which is also one of the reasons why diversity is such an important part of working at Magnopus.
Lastly, a general organizational mindset. Anyone can learn to code, anyone can learn a new foreign language, anyone can learn how to build things. But, it’s much harder to teach someone how to approach a problem, take on board changes to that problem as it progresses, and then organize that into a way in which you can apply all of that knowledge and experience.
What or who inspires you?
One of the reasons why I wanted to get into entertainment was seeing the work of Weta Digital, and Weta Workshop and the marriage of art, artistry, mechanics, the physics of everything, and bringing that into one place. That group of people is tremendously inspiring in how they approach a problem and how they ensure that it is of the highest possible quality bar and not letting anything stop it from being the absolute best it can be.
And just for fun, how would you survive a zombie apocalypse?!
I’d find somewhere that’s easy to defend and has enough land to grow some food, so something like a sea fort. There’s a bunch of them in the Solent where I grew up! I’d probably also stick a wind turbine on the top because it does get breezy, and that would be a great source of energy. Essentially I’d hide out, rather than go ‘Full Rambo’.
What country would you most like to travel to in the world?
The idea of going to just one place is something I don’t tend to think about. I enjoy the act of traveling, so I love road trips and visiting lots of places at once. A ‘money’s no object’ trip for me would be to drive the Pan American Highway which starts in Alaska and ends in South America.
Who would be your dream guest to take with you on this trip?
Oh, that’s easy, a large fluffy dog! Plus a campervan and a camera, and I’m set. I’ll just head off, and take pretty pictures along the way.
