Nathan Weston
Verified Expert in Engineering
Computer Graphics Developer
Watertown, MA, United States
Toptal member since June 24, 2019
Nathan has over 15 years of experience developing applications with a wide range of technologies. He's led the development team for Sapphire, a professional visual effects package, for over five years, during which time the team never missed a deadline. His focus is on system software, high-performance code, and back-end development. He enjoys the flexibility of freelancing and the challenge of taking on a wide range of projects.
Portfolio
Experience
- Python - 15 years
- C++ - 15 years
- Computer Graphics - 10 years
- NVIDIA CUDA - 10 years
- Image Processing - 10 years
- Qt 5 - 5 years
- Common Lisp (CL) - 3 years
- Flask - 1 year
Preferred Environment
Emacs, Git, Windows, Linux
The most amazing...
...thing I've written is a tool for interactively designing realistic lens flare effects, and previewing them in real time.
Work Experience
Software Engineer
GrammaTech, Inc
- Worked with a small team to research new techniques for software analysis, automatic program repair, and security hardening.
- Worked with researchers to build a product based on binary rewriting research.
- Developed prototypes and performed experiments to validate research ideas.
- Contributed to presentations and written reports.
- Created multiple successful prototypes for demonstrations to research sponsors.
Principal Software Engineer
GenArts, Inc
- Led the development team for Sapphire Plug-ins, the premiere suite of visual effects plug-ins for film and video post-production.
- Designed and implemented new effects using cutting-edge image processing algorithms.
- Maintained the compiler and runtime for an in-house image processing language.
- Wrote high-performance, multi-threaded and GPU-accelerated code.
- Continually reviewed and improved development processes.
- Ensured that algorithms produced identical results on CPU and GPU, across multiple operating systems and plug-in APIs.
Experience
GrammaTech IR for Binary Analysis
https://github.com/GrammaTech/gtirbWritten in C++17 with an emphasis on modern coding standards and best practices.
Sapphire Flare Designer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdAnVZP8uaEThe rendering backend uses highly-optimized C++ and CUDA to produce production quality results in real time.
I was the primary author and architect of the UI and wrote most of the rendering code. The version in the linked video was released in 2019, shortly after I left the company, but is not significantly different from the version I created.
Software Evolution Library
https://github.com/GrammaTech/selEducation
Master of Science Degree in Computer Science
Brown University - Providence, RI
Bachelor of Arts Degree in Computer Science
Hamilton College - Clinton, NY
Skills
Libraries/APIs
Vue
Tools
Git, Emacs
Languages
C++, C++11, Python, C++17, Common Lisp (CL), Lisp, Assembler x86, JavaScript
Paradigms
Object-oriented Programming (OOP), Parallel Programming, Functional Programming
Platforms
NVIDIA CUDA, Linux, Windows, MacOS
Frameworks
Flask, Qt 5, Qt
Storage
PostgreSQL, SQLite
Other
Computer Graphics, Image Processing, Compilers, Static Analysis
How to Work with Toptal
Toptal matches you directly with global industry experts from our network in hours—not weeks or months.
Share your needs
Choose your talent
Start your risk-free talent trial
Top talent is in high demand.
Start hiring