Dr. Kenneth Field
Senior Principal Cartographic Product Engineer at ESRI
Ken is a permanently recovering academic from the UK with a Bachelor’s in Cartography from Oxford Polytechnic and a PhD in GIS from the University of Leicester. He grew tired of admin, so he ditched his 20-year academic career and moved to the USA, landing in California.
Today, Ken gives talks, writes, and teaches about cartography, all while making maps at Esri. He is particularly fond of the ICA Commission on Map Design, where he served as Chair for eight years and currently holds the position of Vice-Chair.
Ken has won several awards for his maps, cartographic pedagogy, kitchen tile designs, and his books, including Cartography and Thematic Mapping. He co-founded mappery.org and teaches a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on Cartography, which so far has enrolled over 175,000 participants. Ken also snowboards (reasonably), plays drums (badly), and is a long-suffering supporter of his home-town football team Nottingham Forest.
At the end of the day, maps are both Ken’s profession and passion.
Ing. Ivan Buchta
Creative Lead of Arma Series at Bohemia Interactive
Ivan Buchta (age 47, Czech) has been working on Bohemia Interactive’s Arma series since 2006, specializing in creative direction and delivering authentic environments for tactical mil-sim and survival games. His virtual game worlds, based on real-life geography, have been explored by millions of players over the past two decades. Before entering the video game industry, Ivan’s interest in nature and landscape led him to study environmental sciences at the University of Jan Evangelist Purkyně in Ústí nad Labem (CZ), where he researched the 1st and 2nd Austro-Hungarian Military Surveys. He’s currently attempting to improve his archery skills without compromising his roles of being a father and the Creative Lead of Arma Reforger and Arma 4, the next generation of tactical shooters powered by Bohemia Interactive’s new proprietary technology – Enfusion.