Dean R. Thurston

900 Lexington Street, Waltham, MA 02452

(401) 219-2791 · deanthurston2791@gmail.com

WORK EXPERIENCE

Virtual Maker, Waltham MA January 2024 - Present

Unity Developer

  • Work on Unity contract work for clients 

  • Update / Develop Unity assets such as Proxima for the Unity Asset store

Vicarious Surgical, Waltham, MA October 2021 - October 2023

User Interface Developer

  • Unity programmer in charge of designing and developing interfaces for a surgical robot.

  • Implemented large scale architectural work for the user interface.

  • Worked with NetMQ networking to communicate interface with robot and controllers.

  • Worked in AGILE development sprints.

  • Worked with VR headsets to interface with custom 3 dimensional controllers for surgical robot

Tufts University, Medford, MA   March 2018 - October 2021

Unity Programmer for Human-Robotics Interaction Lab

  • Sole Unity programmer working on human-robot interaction experiments under a NASA contract simulating a robot using ROS (Robot Operating System) in a digital space.

  • Various experiments made in virtual reality (VIVE) for human-robotics interactions.  Client support to graduate students in School of Engineering.

  • Network coding using Unity.

Bearsnake Interactive, Boston, MA

Co-Founder and Lead Game Programmer         May 2017 - October 2020

  • BearSnake is an independent game development company based in Boston, MA.  We built small mobile games for Android and Apple devices, as well as performed contract work designing and building interactive experiences for clients, such as the Northeastern Game Design Studio .

Northeastern Game Design Studio, Boston, MA               January 2015 - September 2017

Lead Game Programmer                                                                         

  • Lead game programmer on a 7 person team (including designers and artists) creating a gaming platform called Mad Science using C# in the Unity Engine

  • Mad Science is a visual coding language and gaming engine for use by non-programmers to design diverse experiments for educational and psychological purposes, including data collection using custom analytics.

  • Did some initial testing for work with the holo-lens and magic leap, seeing how such systems could be used in our current architecture.  

Hasbro, Pawtucket, RI                 January - June 2014

Game Programmer for IPlay Team 

  • Designed various demo games in Unity to test game ideas

  • Connected physical and digital Media, such as visual recognition (QR codes)

  • Applied for patent as sole Inventor; patent pending

  • Developed multiple interfaces to transmit data from a toy to a smart device

EDUCATION

Tufts University, Cambridge, MA Graduate level courses taken towards Masters degree in Human-Robotic Interaction 2019 - 2021

  • Relevant Courses: Ethics for AI, Robotics, and Human Robot Interaction, Human-Computer Interaction  

Northeastern University, Boston, MA

Bachelor of Science in Computer Science & Game Design May 2016

  • Relevant Courses: Logic and Computation, Games and Society, Object Oriented Design, Game Interface Design, Math Fundamentals for Games, Theory of Computation, Computer Graphics, Programming for Games, Building Game Engines, Level Design, Rapid Idea Prototyping Games, Human Computer Interaction, Game AI, Programming Languages, Software Development, Digital Narrative, Database Design, Game Concept Development and Production, Game Scripting, and Game Design Capstone

  • Extracurricular Activities: Game Design Club

  • Awards: 2016 Northeastern Annual Showcase of Games – Best Gameplay and Best Game Overall

East Greenwich High School, East Greenwich, RI June 2011

  • Activities: Computer Club, Robotics Club, Soccer Team, Drama Club, Chorus

  • Attended 3 summers of Robotics Camp at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA

COMPUTER KNOWLEDGE

Languages: ROS, ADE, C#, Java, Racket, C++, JavaScript, Xcode, Python3/2, Actionscript, MySQL, MongoDB, GLSL/HLSL,React, Computer Graphics

Systems: Windows XP, 7, 8, 10, Ubuntu (Linux)

Software: Unity3D, Unreal Engine 4, RVIZ, Microsoft Applications, IOS, Android