This job might no longer be available.
Lead Character Artist
2 years ago
That’s No Moon Entertainment is an independent AAA game development studio established in 2021 by veterans of some of the most recognizable and critically acclaimed creative teams in the world, including Naughty Dog, Infinity Ward, Santa Monica Studio, Bungie, PlayStation, and more. Based in Los Angeles and San Diego, That’s No Moon Entertainment is creating the next generation of narrative-driven, genre-defining experiences built upon a culture of creativity, collaboration, responsible production practices, and individual empowerment. We are assembling a diverse team of passionate developers of a wide range of experience levels and backgrounds to help shape the future of our studio and projects.
We are seeking a Character Lead with a passion for bringing very realistic characters to life to tell evocative stories. Working in a collaborative team with story, rigging, facial and engineering you will have the chance to devise a modern pipeline, using the best scanning and hand-crafted pipelines. You will lead the capture, creation, and final execution of all aspects of the characters for gameplay and cinematic AAA content. With your help we will push the industry to new heights of realism, gameplay, and storytelling.
Responsibilities:
- Direct and create realistic game characters
- Ensure that character designs embody the story, gameplay, and art pillars
- Develop and refine all static and multifaceted material assets for the face including but not wrinkle maps, capillary dilation maps
- Collaborate with production to define sustainable character achievements, schedules and staffing plans while hitting budgets, quality goals, and dates
- Work at the highest level, technically and aesthetically while balancing scope, deadlines, and performance considerations
- Work with all facets of art and tech art to define and implement a character pipeline from acquisition and creation to final in-game lighting and rendering
- Define the technical specs and delivers criteria for the characters that works within our performance budget and oversee the optimization of the assets when the need arises
- Proactively anticipate, troubleshoot, and solve pipeline issues and game bugs
Requirements & Skills:
- Proven portfolio demonstrating the ability to build realistic and iconic characters of the highest quality
- 5+ years of professional character modeling experience in games or film
- Shipped a AAA game as a senior or lead artist
- Knowledge, experience, and interest in using scanned and simulated assets in the creation of characters
- Extensive experience with PBR materials and Substance Painter
- Deep understanding of, and ability to analyze clothing construction, fabric properties and scanned assets
- Excellent eye for human and animal anatomy and realistic organic deformation
- Strong understanding of how to develop, implement and execute efficient character pipelines
- Advanced user of ZBrush
- Maya expertise in areas of modeling, UVing and texturing
- (Bonus) Experience shipping a game in U4
- (Bonus) Substance Designer experience
- (Bonus) Experience rigging/weighting characters for games or film
- (Bonus) Fine art or traditional sculpting background or education
- (Bonus) Fluency in clothing construction and simulation
Qualities:
- Hardworking collaborator seeking to advance art and tech through intra-departmental and multi-discipline partnerships.
- Effective team leader and teammate invested in growth of the character team through encouragement, inspiration, inclusivity, and mutual respect.
- Adept at leading by example and motivating a team committed to excellence in design, process, and execution.
- Strong interpersonal skills with a dedication to building a diverse, hardworking, and empathetic team.
- Skilled and efficient communicator adapt at providing and receiving constructive feedback & direction across all departments
That's No Moon is an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, ancestry, color, citizenship, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, pregnancy, age, national origin, disability status, legally protected physical or mental disability, genetic information, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.