Meet 3D Buzz Team Member Zak Parrish
Originally an artist and aspiring graphic designer, Zak became fascinated with the world of 3D animation and visualization early in his college career. After taking an intensive 12-week course in 3D animation from his mentor Jason Busby, Zak’s career took a sudden shift from student to teacher, as his natural abilities of fast technical comprehension and clear and energetic explanation landed him a job teaching the very material he had worked so hard to learn.
During his time as an animation instructor, Zak also began to use his talents to help Jason develop professional-level training videos for 3D Buzz, Inc., a venture that eventually led to a new job. Today, Zak is the Chief of Operations for 3D Buzz, working closely with Jason. His ability to tackle large-scale production projects and present them in an engaging manner to a global audience allows 3D Buzz to continue to push the limits of technical video-based education.
First and foremost, how would you describe your job at 3D Buzz. In your own words, what do you do?
Like everyone here at 3D Buzz, I end up having to put on a myriad of different hats. In my case, I’m a video training developer for 3D animation, game design, and a little bit of coding here and there. I’m a graphic designer, and am generally in charge of most of the Photoshop work. I design all of the product case labels and CDs, and I designed our logo. I’m the staff writer. I also wind up being the office handyman most of the time.
What is it you like the most about your job? The least?
I think the thing I like most is getting to learn new things all the time. This job is never stagnant. There’s always some new thing that needs to be tackled and most of the time it requires significant research, development, and critical problem solving. Being able to have a job in which you draw a paycheck for learning is a real blessing.
If I had to pick something I didn’t like, it would be the limitations that come along with us being as small as we are. The bottleneck for our throughput is always the number of hands and minds we can task on any given project at one time, and generally, we are stretched pretty thin. I suppose you could argue that this means we regularly bite off more than we can chew. Though, I’d have to retort that we do what we must in order to keep things moving.
Describe a typical day at 3D Buzz from your perspective.
For me, there almost isn’t any such thing. It really all depends on what’s going on at the moment. If I’m working on videos, it involves reviewing back over where we left, off, picking up the microphone, and recording until I can’t anymore. If I’m working on web stuff, it means I continue laying out graphics and reworking them until I can’t anymore. It’s like that. You take whatever task you’re doing, and you beat the crap out of it as best you can for as long as you can, because chances are that there are six other tasks waiting for you that all should have been done days, weeks, or possibly months ago.
Outside of work, do you have any other hobbies or ambitions? Tell us about them.
I enjoy scuba, but haven’t been in a while now. What with Tennessee being landlocked, and all. I dive where and when i can. Florida’s not that far away.
I read a lot. Mostly science fiction and fantasy, but I’m open to just about anything. Really got into Stephen King there for a while, and my current favorite is George R. R. Martin. Though, recently, having finished all of Martin’s current Song of Ice and Fire series, I’ve gone back and re-read Neuromancer by William Gibson, and am trying out Count Zero. I’ve been considering re-reading the Ender’s Game/Shadow series, though I think I’ve just about got those books memorized at this point.
Over the past year, on and off, I’ve been trying to teach myself the guitar. It’s relaxing and something that I’d originally thought I could never do (which is exactly why I’ve been trying to pick it up).
Where are you from? Where’d you grow up?
Originally, I was born in Nashville. When I was about a year old, my family moved to Kansas and then shortly to Valley Springs, which is in Northern California. I spent the bulk of my childhood there, and moved away when I was about 12. I still miss the area.
How did you find yourself doing what you do today?
I was fortunate enough to find some affordable classes in 3D animation at The Renaissance Center in Dickson, TN. At the time, I was working on a degree in Graphic Design and was quickly becoming disenchanted with its focus on letterforms and layout. Like an idiot, I thought the field had something to do with graphics. That was a mentality I would come to recant later, though.
I ended up in Jason’s (that’s Buzz to you) Maya I-12 class, which was this twelve-week monster that ran from 9-5, five days a week (though we were generally in class a lot more than that).
A few minutes later, Jason called me up to his desk, and I figured I was going to be asked to leave. Once I got up there, he quietly asked if I’d ever considered teaching this stuff. Like that, I had a job as an Animation Instructor at The Renaissance Center. When Jason decided to make 3D Buzz his full-time endeavor and leave the Center, I saw it as an opportunity to take what I was doing to the next level, and I’ve been here ever since.
