Tom Lai
Creative Director, Senior Product Designer
Delta, British Columbia, Canada
tomtylai@gmail.com
www.tomlai.com
I am a Creative Director / Product Designer with 10+ years experience delivering products in the digital advertising space involving video games, live/video streaming, and content monetization.
I am experienced in leading creative teams of 5-10 designers and artists, providing critique and feedback for all manners of creative outputs from UI/UX design to marketing and social assets, offering mentorship, and implementing standards and pipelines to raise the quality of design deliverables to industry levels. Bridging the gap between design and development.
Over my career, I have led and worked on various design projects. Leveraging my expertise in UI/UX design to deliver implementation ready designs while tapping into my communication and graphics design skills to present key business logic and concepts pertaining to user experience to stakeholders, and on the business front, producing stunning investor decks and marketing collateral to help business development and sales.
I am experienced in leading creative teams of 5-10 designers and artists, providing critique and feedback for all manners of creative outputs from UI/UX design to marketing and social assets, offering mentorship, and implementing standards and pipelines to raise the quality of design deliverables to industry levels. Bridging the gap between design and development.
Over my career, I have led and worked on various design projects. Leveraging my expertise in UI/UX design to deliver implementation ready designs while tapping into my communication and graphics design skills to present key business logic and concepts pertaining to user experience to stakeholders, and on the business front, producing stunning investor decks and marketing collateral to help business development and sales.
Work Experience
NextPlay Technologies
Senior Product Designer, Creative Director
I joined NextPlay initially as a Senior Product Designer providing expertise in the areas of graphic design, UI/UX design, and corporate branding for NextPlay’s fintech and travel division. This opportunity evolved to a more prominent role as Creative Director at NextPlay’s Media division, HOTPLAY.GAMES, to oversee the Thai creative teams.
As the creative director I provided direction and feedback for all creative outputs from product UI/UX design to marketing and social materials, offer mentorship for artists and designers, and implement standards and guidelines to raise the quality of design and design documentation to industry levels. All in effort to bring HotPlay’s Global Advertising, Game Network, and Gaming Platform to market and tackling the milestones and challenges along the way.
As the creative director I provided direction and feedback for all creative outputs from product UI/UX design to marketing and social materials, offer mentorship for artists and designers, and implement standards and guidelines to raise the quality of design and design documentation to industry levels. All in effort to bring HotPlay’s Global Advertising, Game Network, and Gaming Platform to market and tackling the milestones and challenges along the way.
July 2021
- Present
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Promethean TV
Senior UX Designer
I had the pleasure of joining Promethean TV at the ground floor and help design and ship their flagship product, IGNITE VIDEO. Then continue to build up this product and its major features with each release. My main responsibilities include.
- Lead and drive design projects from initial concept and direction to fully fleshed out and well documented designs that are ready for developers to code against.
- Create and manage complete UI / UX designs for web app that illustrates, key business logic applied to designs, screen flows for all use case scenarios, and responsive behaviour for various display sizes.
- Generate interactive prototypes using Invision and Sketch prototype to visualize and clearly present a project and its main aspects at the conceptual stage to key product owners.
- Design and construct marketing material such as, sales decks, digital fliers, product sheets, and promotional videos to help sales and business efforts.
- Lead and drive design projects from initial concept and direction to fully fleshed out and well documented designs that are ready for developers to code against.
- Create and manage complete UI / UX designs for web app that illustrates, key business logic applied to designs, screen flows for all use case scenarios, and responsive behaviour for various display sizes.
- Generate interactive prototypes using Invision and Sketch prototype to visualize and clearly present a project and its main aspects at the conceptual stage to key product owners.
- Design and construct marketing material such as, sales decks, digital fliers, product sheets, and promotional videos to help sales and business efforts.
March 2017
- June 2021
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Azubu
UI / UX Designer, Graphic Designer
I joined Azubu.tv as a UI/UX designer to work on their main eSports live steam and video-on-demand platform. During my time at Azubu, I had the pleasure of working on their v2.0 web platform and had a critical role in shipping its v3.0 incarnation. The opportunity expanded to include UI/UX design work for Azubu’s proprietary media player and the native mobile Broadcaster Companion app.
April 2015
- January 2017
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Finger Food Studios
Graphic Designer
Working with Unity3D developers. Provide UI designs, 3D assets, and visual FX designs for 2 mobile game projects targeting the Android platform.
January 2015
- March 2015
Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, Canada
Casual Immersions Entertainment
Freelance Digital Illustrator ("Artist")
Contribute to UI and UX design for CASIMM's puzzle RPG adventure game, Puzzle Warriors Adventure, for the iOS platform. Create brand assets and marketing collateral in preparation for game release.
- Proactively push the game's UI and art visuals toward refinement. Helping the game secure an Apple feature under the "Best New Games" category on the App Store in over 60 countries within weeks of release. Greatly increasing app visibility.
- Deliver over 30 unique UI designs complete with icons, buttons, and backgrounds, to create a gorgeous and fun interactive experience for the player.
- Design marketing and branding material including company logo, app icon, banners, social network art assets, ads, and digital magazine spreads to assist in promoting the game and engaging our target audience with sharp looking visuals.
- Proactively push the game's UI and art visuals toward refinement. Helping the game secure an Apple feature under the "Best New Games" category on the App Store in over 60 countries within weeks of release. Greatly increasing app visibility.
- Deliver over 30 unique UI designs complete with icons, buttons, and backgrounds, to create a gorgeous and fun interactive experience for the player.
- Design marketing and branding material including company logo, app icon, banners, social network art assets, ads, and digital magazine spreads to assist in promoting the game and engaging our target audience with sharp looking visuals.
March 2014
- October 2014
Richmond, British Columbia, Canada
Seven Tales Inc.
Illustrator (Contract)
Provided concept illustrations for Dragon Age Keep -- an interactive web experience that helps usher new and existing players into the coming Dragon Age Inquisition title.
- Deliver over 20 vector illustrations using characters, game props, and composition to creatively capture key story moments within Dragon Age: Origin and Dragon Age II's vast and branching plot lines.
- Deliver over 20 vector illustrations using characters, game props, and composition to creatively capture key story moments within Dragon Age: Origin and Dragon Age II's vast and branching plot lines.
October 2013
- December 2013
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Wyley Interactive Inc.
UI/Graphics Designer
Worked on UI and UX design for Play4Perks -- a mobile web app experience connecting mobile gamers, game developers, and local brands, through an achievement based reward system.
- Contribute to Play4Perks' UI/UX redesign to match trending mobile patterns, substantially improving overall app usability and appearance.
- Update sales presentation with UI mock-ups and brand specific imagery to assist sales team engage large clients like Red Bull and Vegas.
- Contribute to Play4Perks' UI/UX redesign to match trending mobile patterns, substantially improving overall app usability and appearance.
- Update sales presentation with UI mock-ups and brand specific imagery to assist sales team engage large clients like Red Bull and Vegas.
September 2012
- August 2013
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
D3 Security Management Systems Inc.
Product Design Manager, UI Designer / Technical Specification Writer
Managed product feature road map and addressed client requests as Product Design Manager. Significant contribution to UI design and documentation for D3's web based incident reporting and case management solution for customers in the Fortune 500.
- Plan and coordinate effort between business, dev, and QA teams to smoothly execute deployment and ad hoc tasks for our clients, raising customer satisfaction.
- Design for over 200 features from analytic reporting to automated workflow modules, increasing D3's competitiveness in the security software market.
- Plan and coordinate effort between business, dev, and QA teams to smoothly execute deployment and ad hoc tasks for our clients, raising customer satisfaction.
- Design for over 200 features from analytic reporting to automated workflow modules, increasing D3's competitiveness in the security software market.
October 2007
- August 2011
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Education
British Columbia Institute Of Technology
Certificate in Digital Animation
Studies in digital animation, 3D design, and modeling with focus in props and environment modeling and texture application.
Volunteered as student mentor in BCIT Digital Arts / ESPM exchange program to offer ideas and guidance to Brazilian design students with regards to 3D. ESPM is a well-know school of design and adveristing in Brazil.
Member of the Digital Arts Industry Night graduation event concept committee. Volunteered as the master of ceremony for the event.
Volunteered as student mentor in BCIT Digital Arts / ESPM exchange program to offer ideas and guidance to Brazilian design students with regards to 3D. ESPM is a well-know school of design and adveristing in Brazil.
Member of the Digital Arts Industry Night graduation event concept committee. Volunteered as the master of ceremony for the event.
April 2011
- April 2012
Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada
Simon Fraser University
Bachelor of Science (Interactive Arts)
Studies mostly concentrated in interaction design with focus on information communication, demographic/trend analysis, and creative thinking to define and resolve undefined design problems.
Particular interest in the above school of thought within the context of games design and application usability.
Particular interest in the above school of thought within the context of games design and application usability.
September 2002
- June 2006
Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada
Languages
English (Fluent),
Cantonese (Native),
Skills
Brand Design,
Digital Animation,
Digital Illustration,
Digital Painting,
Film Editing,
Graphics Design,
Responsive Design,
UI/UX Design,
Web Design,
Software Proficiency
Sketch, Figma, InVision;
Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects, InDesign, Lightroom;
Notion, Word, Outlook, Powerpoint, Excel;
MacOS, Windows
Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects, InDesign, Lightroom;
Notion, Word, Outlook, Powerpoint, Excel;
MacOS, Windows