About me as a person

I talk a lot, but that's usually to avoid speaking too honestly.

I'm French Canadian, Québécois en fait, fier de l'être, proud of it. I love languages, I feel lucky that I know French and English so well, les deux solitudes du Canada... I can manage Spanish a bit more than a tourist, I took some beginner's Japanese classes.

I love to party with my friends.

I live for music, I love going to concerts. I play guitar, bass and a bit of keyboards. I'm currently one of the two guitarists in the instrumental rock band Appalaches.

I read comics. I sometimes draw. I cook to eat (and to impress the girls). I looove chocolate chips cookies, but can't stand chocolate itself. I love poutine (the food, not the russian politician).

I bike to wherever I can to avoid public transportation. If I could I'd skateboard again. I snowboard. I river surf when geographically possible.

I studied Arts and (French) Literature in college, then completed a Minor in Computational Arts at Concordia University. I had the dream of continuing my Major in Intermedia/CyberArts, but life caught on and I had to invest my time on work.

I've had a lot of jobs: janitor, telemarketer, insurance rep, music store clerk, bank customer service rep, intranet content manager, developer in an e-commerce shop, interactive designer and technical lead in an ad agency. I am now a freelance user experience consultant and creative technologist, my clients range from ad agencies to game dev shops to tech startups.

I have dreams. I'm gonna write this great scenario for a novel/comic/movie one day. I'll be part of the creation of one of the most interesting video game ever. I'll write some of the best music (or noise) ever heard (or seen!).

I lived in Montréal and Amsterdam. I hope to live abroad again.

About me as a professional

Throughout all the different jobs I have had, I learned and taught a lot. I am as good a team player as I am able to play be myself. I am thorough and organized, sometimes to a fault. I'm flexible and tolerant, yet strict and firm when necessary. I am also a good problem solver, even under pressure.

I can easily convey and vulgarize information, either to share information or to train others, which makes me quite the documenter. I wrote many best practices documents and wikis to facilitate the work relations and needs between producers, designers, information architects and developers.

As a user experience consultant, I intend to use my technical knowledge and experience to suggest smart strategies in using technologies to appropriately answer the needs of the user, rather than simply pushing for the latest tech buzzword. I can create documents (information architecture, user flow, storyboards) to help others get a clear understanding of the goals to reach. I aim to work more upstream in the creation process: analyze the client's brief and then work with the strategy and the creative teams.

As a creative technologist, I am at ease with many languages (ActionScript 3.0, JavaScript, Objective-C, Ant, Processing, Max/MSP/Jitter), frameworks (jQuery, RobotLegs), concepts (OOP, MVC), as well as software versioning/revision control systems (Git, SVN).

Over the last couple of years I have produced interactive works for many clients–oftentimes on the behalf of the agency for which I worked at the moment of production–, here are a couple:

Please note that these items do not lead to projects I have done, but rather to the respective homepages of each client. If you wish to see some of my works, head to my portfolio.

About me as an artisan

Notice that I do not use the term "artist." In my mind, there is somewhat of a pejorative meaning to call myself an artist. It either brings to mind the self obsessed person who goes around telling others they are an artist, but with no actual talent, or a more idealized character that attained enlightenment and reached some sort nirvana with art. Neither feel like what I am.

I would like to think of myself as an artisan because I use my skills and techniques in order to create concrete works, whether they are commercial or with personal creative goals. I am not afraid to say I will use my skills to make a living. On the side, when money and time permits, I will create personal and emotional works that please me.

I am a musician, so sound and noise has to be a part of what I aim to do. I am also a gamer, so there may be a fun or competitive part in my interactive works. I love beautifully designed things, so I may have a slick and minimal design to my works. I love many disciplines, and although I may not master all the disciplines I touch, I reserve myself the right to use all possible technical and artistical means to achieve what I envision.