The Art Director bridges the art team with the producers, development, and design teams, and is responsible for leading and fully realizing the vision for our games. They will heavily inform the art production pipeline and ensure that assets are crafted in a way complimentary to the strengths and limitations of the technology used. This person has a strong ability to adapt to shifting priorities, navigate through problems, take ownership and bring something from concept to completion. The position requires a fluency in modern 3D art creation techniques and an avid interest in pushing the leading edge of game art development, specifically in VR.
Responsibilities
- Collaborates with stakeholders, executives and department leads to deliver world-class visuals on schedule and within scope and budget.
- Works with the Game Director to bring the project vision to life, the Game Designer to create polished and functional gameplay spaces, and the Producer to scope, plan, and assign work to artists.
- Will oversee, and is expected to help create, looks development, concepting development, layouts, designs, graphics, models, textures and shaders and other production materials.
- Will direct, mentor, and review the work of a team of 3D and technical artists.
- Will develop benchmark assets to help communicate artistic direction and style to the team.
- Keeps a close eye on maintaining an art production pipeline, process and workflow that ensures art assets are delivered and integrated as per studio standards.
- Will be proactive in providing solutions, mitigating risk and anticipating and correcting creative issues.
- Will be hands on in production and expected to undertake a variety of technical art tasks including lighting, shader development, and other VFXs.
Skills
- 3D generalist skills including modeling, texturing, shader creation and environment skills.
- Strong foundational art skills in color, composition, and form.
- Familiarity with game development and the interrelation between game design and game art.
- Excellent leadership, communication, interpersonal, and organizational skills.
- Ability to balance creative leadership with arts production and deadlines.
- Ability to define deadlines and task time estimates, work well under pressure, and able to multitask effectively.
- Ability to work with all disciplines to find efficient pathways for implementing the artistic vision within the limitations of the platform hardware.
- Ability to lead by example via consistent contribution, hands-on attitude and cohesive efforts.
- Self-motivated, with a strong work ethic.
Requirements
- Must have 5+ years of experience and shipped at least 2 titles on current generation hardware.
- Familiarity with VR games, ideally experience creating content for the medium.
- Demonstrable art ability in 3D or VR mediums.
- Intimate knowledge of asset creation in modern DCC tools.
- A strong knowledge of game development engines (Unity or Unreal) and their specific art integration pipelines.
- Experience with PBR, Lighting, and Non-Destructive workflows in real time engines.
- Experience in optimization techniques which enable projects to retain high visual fidelity while achieving high frame rates in VR.
- Knowledgeable in stylized and realistic game production workflows in engine and digital art software.
Secret Location is committed to equality of opportunity in all aspects of employment. We are committed to making all employment decisions without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, marital status, or any other legally protected status. If you are contacted for a job opportunity, please advise us of any accommodation needed to ensure you have access to a fair and equitable process.
We thank everyone for their interest but only those candidates selected for an interview will be contacted.
