About
Probably one of the most creative and versatile people you'll ever meet.
Student Development Manager / Game Development Director
I spend most of the working week at SCRATCHPAD Albany working as a teacher, manager, and course curriculum developer. Outside of that, I'm working as a director and all-rounder of my own game development company, V0ID Productions.
- Age:
- Phone: (+64) 21 108 1934
- Email Address: aquilahalpe@gmail.com
- City: Auckland, New Zealand
- Native language: English
- Other languages: Japanese, Spanish
Experience
These are the areas I have spent significant chunks of my life immersed in.
Years drawing, painting, illustrating
Years making music
Years of customer and enterprise service
Years writing content or correspondence professionally
Years programming
Years practicing martial arts
Years 3D modelling
Years developing games
Years managing companies
Years in team leadership
Years acting
Skills
These are skills developed in particular technologies, programming languages, human languages or software.
Resume
As Student Development Manager, I am primarily responsible for making sure that the educational content that the students are consuming is to a high standard and especially in the context of a small business, this means that it has to be engaging and keeps the students interested in continuing their enrolment as long as possible. As SCRATCHPAD Albany is a technology learning center, this involves teaching several disciplines, including but not limited to programming, 3D modelling, graphic design, electronics, robotics, and more. Due to the nature of the business, I will usually end up trying to teach students other areas of interest as well, such as 2D animation and video editing. As the founder, director and creator of V0ID Productions, I initially started making our flagship project Necromancer during the first COVID lockdown in New Zealand in 2020. I felt like the best way to pass the time was to teach myself 3D modeling, which opened the door to be able to fully develop a 3D game by myself, given the previous skills I had been acquiring over the course of my life. After about three years of developing the game by myself, I was comfortable enough to open out the development of the game to a small team. We are currently still in the process of building this game, but we are very happy with the process and the progress that we have made and are excited to release it to the public. We have a playable demo out on Steam which has been quite unanimously positively received.
Summary
Aquila Halpé
Highly creative, professional, methodical, and organised. I began in customer service, and have kept this experience close so as to implement it to a high degree throughout my career, especially after moving into software development and management.
- North Shore, Auckland, New Zealand
- (+64) 21 108 1934
- aquilahalpe@gmail.com
Education
Graduate Diploma in Computing
2016 - 2017
Unitec Institute of Technology, Auckland, New Zealand
I decided to explore programming to a large extent at this point in my life, and opted to try and have a scatter shot approach to be able to figure out which areas of programming resonated with me the most. I tried out game development, Android app development, Frontend and Web application development, and GUI (Windows Application) development. Game development was what resonated with me the most, but I decided that I would explore career options in all these different areas after my diploma in any case.
Certificate of Proficiency
2015
Unitec Institute of Technology, Auckland, New Zealand
After doing some soul searching and attempting to find some sort of direction for my career at this point, I decided that I would try university education again and explore any different avenues that were quite unlike most of the avenues I had been exploring previously. It was here that I decided to do a Certificate of Proficiency, which allowed me to try select papers in different fields without needing to commit to the expense of a full qualification. I tried out business, music, programming, and graphic design. This ended up being extremely valuable as it taught me that programming was not as daunting as I had previously expected and was much more accessible, especially given my previous skills and interests. This spurred me on to do my Graduate Diploma in Computing, which led me to the career pathway which I'm following now.
Bachelor of Arts
2009 - 2012
University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
After having finished high school I was still reasonably uncertain about the direction that I wanted to go and so I explored a few different options for the most part I decided to go with my strengths which were English and Japanese as the with the subjects that I got the highest marks for in examinations. I was rather disillusioned by the facetious and reasonably pretentious nature of university English education, so I decided to change my focus from English to Spanish to keep somewhat more of a focus on culture and language, and a more practical education. This was a very enlightening experience and taught me a lot about different cultures and was very enjoyable. I continued my university education while also picking up some papers in other skills such as law, psychology, chemistry and a few other general papers such as that.
Cambridge International Education
2003 - 2008
Auckland Grammar School, Auckland, New Zealand
In Auckland Grammar School we were able to learn the standard subjects required for university entrance such as English and mathematics in more detail and I was also able to explore sciences a little bit more. I was able to get more of a handle of physics especially considering my interest in game development and I was also playing around with other things such as animation in my own time. I spent the final few years of my high school career doing subjects such as graphics, design, visual art, physics, English (especially English literature,) Japanese, mathematics and even explored economics somewhat closer to the end.
Primary and Intermediate Schooling
2000 - 2003
Parnell District School, Auckland, New Zealand
When I came to New Zealand, I was also exposed to other technologies such as working with woodwork, fabrics, clay, and getting more into mathematics and sciences, drama, literature, and much more. I was involved in a few theatrical productions at this time which were quite fun and I didn't consider that I would seriously consider it for work until much more recently where I decided to look into professional acting.
Early Schooling
1995 - 2000
Saint Thomas' College, Mount Lavinia, Colombo, Sri Lanka
When I left Montessori and started my graded schooling, I showed notable aptitude in English languages and mathematics to a degree. Having come from a family that is primarily English-speaking in a non-English-speaking environment, it meant that I grew up in a reasonably multilingual background. I was also exposed to lots of other disciplines, such as religious studies and sciences at a young age as a result, learning about Christianity, Buddhism, electronics, and other similar sorts of technologies, even at a very young age. I had always wanted to be a game developer from a very young age, basically as long as I can remember. However, I didn't quite have the ambition or the inclination towards such technical things as programming until much more recently.
Professional Experience
ICT Supervisor / Student Development Manager
2019 - Present
SCRATCHPAD Albany, Auckland, New Zealand
- Technology Learning Center Teaching technology (Programming, 3D Modelling, Graphic Design, Robotics), with secondary tasks of Customer Service, Sales and Retention, Administration.
- Student Development Manager from 15/06/2020; greater focus on management, course development, content writing, engagement, customer experience & QA.
- Helped pull the business through coronavirus and other dire administrative obstacles.
- Contact : Todd Xu (Director) - (+64)21337472
Programmer
2022 - Present
LAITNF Game Studios
- Programming for Project LG (www.laitnf.com)
- Working on movement, flight, and teleportation systems
- Working on animation integration
- Other miscellaneous programming tasks
Fee Management and Retention Consultant
2018
Les Mills, Auckland, New Zealand
- Duties included multitasking inbound customer service phone calls, email queries, retention, internal account administration, internal queries, contract checking. Also provided unofficial tech support and recommendations for system streamlining.
Technical Customer Service Representative
2013 - 2015
Slingshot, Auckland, New Zealand
- Inbound customer service and technical support, email correspondence, formal complaints, support for other agents, connections and provisioning.
Telephone Interviewer
2010 - 2012
Infield International, Auckland, New Zealand
- Outbound market research survey calling.
Portfolio
These are various projects I have created or been involved in, including software projects, university projects, visual art, tattoos, and more. Click here for a full art gallery.
- All
- Headshots
- Major projects
- Digital Art
- Paintings
- Tattoos
- Other media
- Copic Illustrations
- Black and white sketches
Testimonials
These are some testimonials of my character and professional conduct.
Aquila has been a pleasure to work with; he’s hardworking and is always on top of the tasks that need doing while ensuring they're done to the highest standard. Not only that, but he’s also always doing more than needed to make the lives of the rest of his coworkers easier.
Aaron Heald
Supervisor, SCRATCHPAD Albany
Working with Aquila I have found him to be friendly and approachable along with putting an effort into making things at work simplified and understandable such that working with him is easy and enjoyable.
Denzel Foley
Supervisor, SCRATCHPAD Albany
I find Aquila to be very helpful, especially in the administrative, academic, and marketing parts of running our business. Aquila brings a lot of skills to our business, such as programming, teaching, course development, marketing, graphic design and video editing. Aside from work I enjoy talking with him about personal things as well like drinks, family, politics, business, and useful books. Aquila is enjoyable to work with and very helpful to our organisation.
Todd Xu
Director, SCRATCHPAD Albany
It's always great to be working alongside Aquila. Having his exceptional team working skills and a can do attitude really does help lighten the load, especially when faced with unforeseen challenges in the classroom. Outside of Scratchpad Aquila has also been continuing to develop his skill set, working on and leading a game development project called “Necromancer”. Here I was working alongside him as a 3D generalist, developing the graphical side of things, while he acted as creative director. His style of direction and leading allowed for growth among his team, encouraging others to share their ideas to help strengthen his vision of the final product.
Tim Reinhold
Supervisor, SCRATCHPAD Albany
3D Artist, Environment Artist and Level designer, VOID Productions
Aquila's cleverness is second to none. His dedication and honesty is something that is truly difficult to find these days. A true genius without question.
Kalyn Lessiter
Creative Director of LAITNF Game Studios
I’m so proud of my son Aquila - from the age of 3 he’s always known what he wanted to be, a game software developer, and he has excelled in that area, producing a working demo of his first project, Necromancer, entirely solo until he got the team together. At the same time he has developed many other creative, knowledge and language skills, and is a focused, responsible teacher and leader that has inspired many friends and students to follow his example.
Guy Halpé
Senior Technical Writer, Gentrack
Contact
Feel free to contact me by email, phone, or social media. I look forward to hearing from you.
Location:
North Shore, Auckland, New Zealand
Email:
aquilahalpe@gmail.com
Call:
(+64) 21 108 1934