VFX Artist

At Rovio Toronto we are a small (and mighty!) team of passionate gamers. We have a knack for working with high profile brands and taking them to new heights in highly enjoyable and fresh games. Our current focus is mobile with aspirations to explore other platforms in the mid/long term as we recognize new opportunities in our constantly evolving market. Our human-scale keeps up nimble and means that everyone has a meaningful part to play.

We value transparency and candor, empowering each other to do our best work and achieve true work/life balance. Our hybrid work model allows for flexibility while still maintaining a strong sense of community.

Join us and help us build a culture of trust, passion, and innovation!

At Rovio, we believe that great games are made by people who are passionate about actually making them! As our 1st (and only!) VFX Artist, you will be responsible for creating high-quality visual effects that enhance the player experience and bring our game world to life. Working under a Lead/Sr artist, you will have the opportunity to try doing something on your own and stretch the boundaries of your current experience. This role is ideal for someone ready for their next step in their career.

As a VFX Artist, you are responsible for:

• Craft stylized VFX that match the quality and style requirements of the Angry Birds brand
• Create 2D VFX/flipbooks like of elemental effects (water splashes, fire, electricity, smoke, and so on), impact/hit VFX, magic glows/spells/abilities and so on
• Understand the goals of the project and craft VFX that are not only aesthetically pleasing but also meet gameplay requirements
• Work closely with the design and development teams to ensure that VFX meet the game's vision and technical requirements
• Optimise VFX for mobile platforms while maintaining visual fidelity
• Stay up-to-date with the latest industry techniques and tools for VFX creation
• Work collaboratively with other artists and developers to create a cohesive and immersive game experience
• Iterate on VFX based on feedback from stakeholders
• Create documentation and guidelines for VFX creation and implementation

You’ll need these skills:

• Ability to create hand drawn/stylized 2D VFX in Toon Boom, After Effects, Animate, TVPaint
• Previous professional/studio experience as VFX Artist doing hand drawn VFX flipbooks
• Good understanding of colour theory, composition, and visual storytelling
• Ability to work collaboratively in a fast-paced environment
• Excellent communication skills
• Strong interpersonal communication skills - in a hybrid-work future with teams working together physically and distributed in equal measure, the need for clarity-building communication is paramount
• High degree of self-motivation and initiative taking

Nice to have skills:

• Proficient in industry-standard software such as Unity, Adobe Creative Cloud, Blender/3ds max/Maya, Miro, Git, Asana, Jira.
• Experience creating VFX for mobile games, experience in PC/Console would be considered a bonus
• Experience with particle effects, shaders, and post-processing effects
• Experience with scripting languages such as C# or Python
• Knowledge of animation and/or 2D art techniques

Do you have everything we’re looking for? Of course not! No one does. If you feel strongly you have something to contribute to our team then please apply anyways!

Rovio is committed to building an inclusive workplace and we encourage a full range of diverse and talented candidates to apply for our open positions.

Our community of Rovians is made up of people from over 50 nationalities who each bring their own unique perspective to their craft and their projects. We believe diversity is the key to making the best games and entertainment for global audiences, allowing us to innovate by transforming existing ideas by adding our continuously evolving knowledge.

We welcome applicants to use the name they want to be addressed by in the application form, regardless of whether it is their legal name.