Matthew Johnston
Hard work and innovative thinking paid of for Matthew, Graduate of Bachelor of Information Technology
As a capstone project of his Bachelor of Information Technology programme, Matthew Johnston and his team took up the challenge to markedly improving the split-second decision-making skills of rugby players through technology. Successful completion of this project in 2005 marked not only the end of Matthew's programme of study, but was unexpectedly a catalyst for a career that combines his programming skills with one of his major passions, cricket.
"Our project was displayed at the BIT Industry Showcase at the end of the year, and Ian Taylor (of Taylormade Media) brought three guys down to have a look. I had also actually played cricket with his son. A few weeks later I got a phone call and was asked if I was interested in a job."
Matthew joined the sports division of Animation Research, a leading computer graphics production facility based in Dunedin, where he was immediately put to work producing real-time sporting graphics for television broadcast.
"I started, and within two weeks I was on a plane to Auckland to work on rugby league learning to operate equipment in a live TV studio. The next week I had to actually operate the equipment for half a match. The following week I had to set up and train another person! After two months Ian said 'do you have a passport'?"
Matthew was put on a plane to India where he spent several weeks operating cricket scoring software and producing live TV graphics in studio that was receiving live feeds from around the world. The job was high-pressure; Indian viewers had the choice of watching live cricket coverage, replays, or a channel devoted just to the computer graphics his team was producing. It was the first of many trips Matthew has taken to India, where cricket is indeed a national obsession.
It was fortunate that Matthew had a bit more up his sleeve than programming skills. A member of the Green Island Cricket Club and long-time fan of the game, a little understanding went a long way to coping with the pressure.
"They wanted a young person who could travel, and it was sink or swim. If you can't work under high-pressure than you're no good for this job. My cricket experience definitely helped because I already knew how to score a game. And while I didn’t have all the skills I needed when I entered the job, studying at the Polytechnic, especially the project work, gave me the tools so I could actually learn quickly."
"I had no idea this job would exist – the phone call came out of the blue. In the end I stumbled into probably the best job of my life."
