Introduction

Hi, my name is Joey Lenz, and I’m originally from Missouri. I’m currently a Senior Level Lighting Artist at Naughty Dog, working on The Last of Us Part II.

I remember very clearly what first inspired me at a young age. I was around 5 when my parents bought me a SNES for Christmas. One of the games that came with it was Super Mario World. And boy, was I ecstatic to unwrap that one! My “eureka” moment occurred during the first level when I had Mario jump and hit a question mark box. Yoshi popped out, and I was completely blown away. I became fascinated with how the interactive mechanics worked, even though I had no clue at the time. And so, my interest in games, beyond just playing them, began with Yoshi changing my life.

My digital art career started with me doing some graphic design and visual effects. I worked a few smaller gigs and independent films, but my career in games took off on a whim from my best friend, Phil Liu. He was studying game design at the time and suggested I try learning the Unreal Engine 3. It wasn’t long before I fell in love with real-time artwork and the level of interactivity provided. What I found to be the perfect combination was that I could take the cinematic visual fidelity of film and optimize it for run-time utilization in an in-the-round, digital environment. Since those days, I’ve worked on various game series, like Call of Duty, Halo, Forza Motorsport, etc.