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Senior Unity Technical Artist (Remote)

Seismic Squirrel LLC

Job Title: Senior Unity Technical Artist

Our Games: Narrative-centric RPG videogames set in an alternate history 1930s New York.

Role: Create and integrate into Unity various art and VFX assets.

Experience: Senior Level, 8+ years of professional technical art experience working on videogames in Unity.

Location: USA or Canada (Remote) – Must reside within the UTC-4 to UTC-8 timezones.

Company Size: 24

Pay Rate: $55-70 USD per hour – Depends on skills and experience.

Job Type: Contract-to-Hire (see below)

Portfolio Required: All applicants must submit a portfolio representing their artwork.

Overview

We are looking for a creative and resourceful Senior Unity Technical Artist experienced working in a professional videogame development environment using Unity.  They are a logical and systemic thinker with an iterative approach to development, someone with a collaborative spirit, excellent communication skills, and an enthusiasm for RPG and turn-based videogames.  The ideal candidate enjoys working with talented artists, designers, writers, engineers, and management, with a drive to create a beautiful and immersive gameplay experience.

This is a remote position which requires regular team collaboration online during our company's core work hours (9:30 AM – 4:30 PM Pacific), attending relevant meetings (e.g. daily scrums, sprint planning and retrospectives, and cross-departmental collaboration).  Occasional evening calls should be expected for collaboration with overseas vendors.  The option to convert to full-time employee may be available to ideal candidates, depending on their location, skills, fit, project needs and schedule, and timing.  H-1B transfers and sponsorships are not available at this time.

Quests

• Create and integrate 2D artwork, integrating layers, transparency, and parallax effects.
• Create and integrate 3D models, including vehicles, environment objects, props, and textures.
• Create and integrate 2D and 3D VFX, materials, shaders, and animations.
• Handle cameras, lighting and reflections, set dressing, particles, surfaces, rigging, and physics.
• Optimize and profile visual elements to ensure suitable frame rates and load times.
• Provide interesting and effective visual solutions for challenging art requirements.
• Prototype new visual concepts.
• Work with the art and narrative teams to ensure that artwork accurately reflects the game's visual design and themes.
• Troubleshoot art problems within our videogames.
• Mentor other artists as they expand their technical art skills.
• Educate and explain technical art concerns to the rest of the development team.
• Actively collaborate with the rest of the development team, openly communicating progress and problems, helping us to set realistic project timelines and expectations.
• Participate in internal game testing and feedback from an artistic perspective.
• Help to create and maintain core technical documentation.
• Balance and prioritize tasks to meet deadlines, working within agreed timeframes and budgets.

Character Stats

• 8+ years of experience as a technical artist working in professional videogame development.
• Experienced through the full lifecycle of videogame development from start to finish:
  concept, design, prototyping, programming, content creation, testing, optimization, launch, support.
• Deeply understands perspective and lighting.
• Able to work within an established artistic style.
• Familiar with technical artistry best practices, design patterns, and unit testing.
• Understands Unity, its render pipelines, and how it interacts with various forms of art.
• Excellent problem-solving skills, resourceful, able to find solutions when needed.
• Enthusiastic for quality gameplay and familiar with the art styles of many games and genres, past and present.
• Strong self-discipline, motivated, a self-starter with a drive for excellence.
• Organized, detail-oriented, able to work fast and loose or carefully with quality when each is needed.
• Courteous and patient, able to work effectively with people across disciplines and personality types.
• Adaptable: The job can change according to the needs at hand and requires wearing various hats.
• Skilled at working remotely using various collaboration tools.
• Possesses strong written, visual, and verbal English language communication and presentation skills.
• Passionate for the videogame industry and a desire to grow within it.
• Understands source control and project branching strategies.
• Experienced working with professional art tools (e.g. Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects, 3ds Max, Blender, Adobe Substance Painter).
• Proficient in Microsoft Word, Excel, and Visio.
• Passionate to learn new tools and technologies.

Bonus Points

• Has strong 3D modeling and texturing skills, understanding how to work in a 3D space.
• Able to create full orthographic views of object assets for use by 3D modelers.
• Experienced using ZBrush.
• Skilled in scripting for enhancing and automating tools (e.g. Python, Lua).
• Understands UI design.
• Located in one of our hub metros: Seattle, Los Angeles, Edmonton.

The Company

Seismic Squirrel is a talented and passionate team of both industry veterans and enthusiastic newcomers.  We share a strong desire to tell fascinating stories supporting engaging gameplay mechanics.

If this sounds like an exciting opportunity for you, and you're located and authorized to work in the USA or Canada, please submit your cover letter, résumé, and a link to your art portfolio to Seismic Squirrel.

For more information about Seismic Squirrel, go to https://www.SeismicSquirrel.com/