Jon Tonks

I grew up building my own computers in the dark days before broadband. As high speed internet rolled out I explored this new world head first through gaming, early chat sites and poorly made Geocities pages.

My love of technology joined forces with my passion for making music when I went to University to study Music Technology. It’s still exciting to me that someone with a modest computer and the right software can record and arrange music that can be released for the world to hear, all from their house.

I feel fortunate that I am just about old enough to remember the world before broadband, smartphones and computers powerful enough to run photorealistic game environments!

“I always wanted to be working in fields that understand and embrace how far we’ve come in such a short time, whilst looking forward to what we can accomplish next.”

I have an extremely varied role in the company due to my experience in many of the different facets of event delivery. Over the years this has ranged from configuring complicated setups ready to go to shows, to QA testing our software prior to release.

More recently I have been busy developing the teams 3D skillset for our many exciting virtual projects. It’s been incredibly rewarding building virtual environments which can be enjoyed and used by people all over the world.

“The best advice I could give to my successor is to dive head first into an opportunity to do something you haven’t done before. Embrace stepping out of your comfort zone.”

The opportunity for constant learning and using these new skills to deliver great projects, in addition to collaborating with others, is what drives me in my role. The most challenging part of my role is keeping on top of all the exciting possibilities and opportunities in the field.

Gravit8 has a culture of adaptability. As a team we are able to flip from relaxed, to all hands on deck on a dime. This has helped us deliver some projects within deadlines that I wouldn’t have thought possible until I was part of getting it done.

“It’s a culture of opportunity. I’ve been lucky enough to work in a variety of roles for the company and I never know when the next chance to try something new will come along. I can safely say I have never been sat still for too long here!”

The last few years have seen the terms blockchain, metaverse and web 3 come to the forefront of people’s minds when they think of emerging technologies. I am excited to see what happens in our field as the landscape of the internet changes.

I’m also excited to see how physical and virtual events find new and interesting ways to merge and work together.