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Senior Art Director - MAXIS

Senior Art Director | Maxis

Welcome to Maxis, home to tinkerers, craftspeople, & storytellers. Our drive is to inspire everyone to make a better world through creative play. As the developer of the Sims, we create games and experiences for millions of people around the world and are always looking for new ways to inspire our players. Maxis is a place where you can do what you love and help others grow while doing it; a place where your unique voice can be heard and seen. We put creativity and inclusivity at the core of our work and don’t settle for seeing the world only as it is, but strive to build a world as it could be. Read on to see how you can join our team and dream big.

We are seeking a high-level, video game development art director to champion the visual experience of our next project. Our ideal candidate is adept at driving a clear aesthetic vision and evangelizing it across our internal and partner organizations. They come with a passion for what we do and the collaborative know-how to make ambitious dreams a reality.

Responsibilities

• Sell our new project’s visual experience to partners both within and outside our game development team
• Own and champion providing clarity to the art team when there is ambiguity in the vision for the product
• Team up with project and brand leadership to deliver key results for high level objectives
• Foster and drive innovation that aligns to high-level, cross discipline objectives within the game team
• Create and promote style guides and high-level documentation
• Nurture the growth and well-being of the art team
• Grow and train artists to own high level goals and improve results, pipelines and processes
• Support the development of partnerships with external outsourcing partners to ensure quality, consistency and delivery
• Collaborate with other art directors owning specific elements within the experience
• Collaborate with art directors, leads, tech art and engineering to establish best-in-class pipelines and workflow
• You'll report to and work with the studio art director

Qualifications

• Skilled art director with 10 years experience in game development and at least one shipped title as a video game art director
• Experienced at establishing and pitching an art vision and guidelines
• Accomplished in leading and inspiring teams of artists and championing execution from pre-production, production and into an evolving live service
• Titles shipped on multiple platforms, including mobile and HD formats.
• An understanding of all aspects of contemporary 3D game development: concept art, character modeling, prop modeling, environment modeling, lighting, animation, visual effects and user interface design.
• Experienced in working with team partners to create content plans and developing a staffing ramp to make those plans possible
• Experience setting up and working with external development partners
• Problem-solving and prototyping ability
• Strong sense for visual storytelling, composition, lighting, form and palette
• Deep, demonstrated passion for game development and game art

Bonus

• Experience in platforms that use user generated content