Danny Oakes

About Danny Oakes

As a photographer and musician, the tools I use are an extension of the artistic process. Providing essential feedback and enabling deep creative flow. These tools may be restrictive, to foster new ways of approaching problems, or they may reduce friction to eliminate problems all together. Both are valid and important approaches to art tools. For the past decade I have been fortunate enough to apply this experience to drive development of 3D art tools at SpeedTree and Unity Technologies. Applying my background in building artistic communities, I was able to connect feedback from customers to the development pipeline, translating abstract workflows into key features that could be delivered by the engineering team. From there, I focused my efforts on rebuilding the marketing, web, and sales workflows for SpeedTree. Managing key partnerships and overseeing sales, SpeedTree saw exponential growth before being acquired by Unity Technologies in 2021. As part of Unity, I’m excited to continue developing new ways for artists to build environments, focusing on innovative solutions to real problems. With developments in AI we are approaching an exciting period of development that will require even more focus on artistic workflows and feedback to harness AI effectively. I can’t wait to share some of the new tools that we’re building with Unity that will drive environment art and vegetation tools forward!

Experience

1. Senior Solutions Architect

   Unity

   Feb 2024 — Present · Logan, UT, US

   Working with a specialized technical sales team to sell SpeedTree and other key products in the Unity portfolio.

Education

• Columbia International University

  Bachelor of Science (BS), Music

  2004 — 2008