This job might no longer be available.
Senior Environment Artist - Generalist
1 year ago
Located in thriving Austin, Texas, Airship Syndicate was founded by four industry vets formerly of Vigil Games - the house that Darksiders built. Led by visionary comic artist Joe Madureira, we work with a wide group of talented contributors located both in our studio and around the world. Our projects include Battle Chasers: Nightwar, Darksiders Genesis, Ruined King: A League of Legends Story, and the upcoming Wayfinder.
Our goal is simple: build a lean, fun, independent game studio to create top-quality games for a variety of gaming platforms.
Airship Syndicate is seeking a talented and passionate Senior Environment Artist to join our team. As a Senior Environment Artist, you will play a key role in the creation of breathtaking and immersive game environments, contributing to the overall visual direction of our projects. We are looking for an artist who has a love for stylized asset creation, levels, and attention to detail. You will contribute by creating environment props, textures, and materials, as well as world-building. A qualified candidate will be able to help meet the needs for gameplay and performance while balancing artistic goals.
RESPONSIBILITIES:
- Collaborate with the Art Director, Art Lead, Level Designers, and other artists to conceptualize and create high-quality environments that meet the project's vision and technical requirements.
- Create and implement environment assets and levels that are optimized for real-time performance, while also achieving high-quality visuals.
- Use 3d tools to create a variety of environment assets, taking them from blockout to final production-ready quality.
- Be open to and implement feedback from your Leads, Art Director, and team members.
- Work with your Lead and Producers to help define and maintain clear goals and schedules.
- Help set the bar for quality and maintain a cohesive art style.
- Work with your Leads to identify solutions to problems and creative ideas that can push the environments in new ways.
- Participate in playtesting and engage with team members to iterate, problem-solve and enhance the game through collaborative development.
REQUIREMENTS:
- A strong portfolio demonstrating your ability to create a variety of stylized environments, props, materials, textures, etc.
- The ability and willingness to complete complicated tasks and overcome new challenges.
- Proficiency in software such as 3ds Max, Maya, ZBrush, or equivalent 3D modeling tools, as well as knowledge of texturing software such as Substance Painter and Photoshop
- Proficiency in Unreal 4 or another game engine. Will be required to learn to use Unreal 4 if it is not already proficient. The ideal candidate is comfortable importing and implementing assets in UE4, working with the material editor to build materials, and comfortable doing some amount of world-building.
- Proficiency in building complex or complicated 3d Assets for games. Organic and hard-surface workflows are required. A firm understanding of forms, shape language, design, and stylized texturing processes are necessary.
- Experience with real-time engine constraints and optimization techniques.
- Excellent communication skills and the ability to work effectively in a collaborative, cross-disciplinary team environment.
- A passion to continue to grow in your craft and collaborate with your team to learn new techniques and processes.
- Self-directed, enthusiastic, and positive, embrace critique and growth.
PLUSES:
- Experience with Unreal Engine 4 and Unreal 5.
- A passion for video games and a deep appreciation for environments in games.
- Experience with Blueprints, simple animations, or advanced understanding of the material editor in Unreal.
- Airship Syndicate offers a fun, creative, and technically challenging environment with excellent compensation and a full range of benefits. If you are a motivated, talented, and driven Environment Artist, we would love to hear from you!
Our Benefits:
Healthcare that includes: complete medical, dental, and vision plans that cover you and your dependents.
Life insurance plus short and long-term disability.
Generous matching retirement contributions so you can live the good life after you retire.
Flexible Spending Accounts
Open Paid Time Off
Profit-Sharing
Relocation packages
Perks Upon Perks:
A world-beating, custom-made board gaming table
Payday Friday Off
Flex Days, where working from home is optionally allowed
Office movie lunches at Alamo Draft House (when we're not in a pandemic)
Access to your favorite snacks and beverages
MAME cabinet
GrubHub Account w/ meal credits
How We Work
Autonomy through collaboration:
We remove as many barriers as possible between you and productivity. We’ll ask you to be self-reliant and self-motivated, with the expectation that you talk frequently with your lead and teammates to keep everyone aligned.
Focused project management:
We don’t manage just to manage. We’re building a system and process that is helpful, but not intrusive. If someone is asking you for a status update, it’s probably because they are working with you on the thing they are asking about, or are planning to use it.
Small team environment:
Size is relative (especially in today’s dev world), but we’re all about direct interaction with teammates, experimenting with ideas, and less bureaucracy.
Our Values
High Performance:
Average will never be our target. We work hard to put the special sauce in each game we create, and this forms the core of our identity. It also pushes us to evolve. As we strive to be better together, we grow together.
Mutual Respect:
We respect the time and extraordinary efforts of our employees by offering generous PTO, profit-sharing, WFH days (even pre-pandemic), and an understanding of personal circumstances. Making great games often takes a lot; we aim to give a lot in return, by committing to share our success with our team.
Approachability:
Making something “fun” is inherently subjective, and can’t come without disagreement. We value being open, honest, and approachable. Respect breeds communication and good communication means good games. If you aren’t approachable, in good times and bad, Airship isn’t for you.
Help Us Build It
We are still trying to achieve our goals, and probably always will be. We’re looking for thoughtful, creative folks to help us move the goalpost.
Create Your Profile — Game companies can contact you with their relevant job openings.