Lead Technical Artist (Games)

Who We Are

We are Skybound.

We love creators. We love fans. We love thrilling games, indelible images and moving stories. Our roots are in comics, but our brands extend to video games, television, movies, merchandise, and live experiences. We take special pride in original tales, fresh characters, and diverse voices.

From well-known franchises to freshly-minted originals, we offer the chance to join brilliant creators shaping a new generation of entertainment in a concentrated, agile environment where every perspective matters, and any idea can create a breakthrough.

Opportunity

Skybound is looking for a Lead Technical Artist to join in the creation of a new, unannounced project, with a unique and stunning art style executed on top of UE5. The Lead Technical Artist will establish, drive, and maintain pipelines, manage a team of technical artists, and ensure assets going into the game are sustainable and high quality.

As a Lead Technical Artist, you will oversee the pipelines and processes used by the art team to bring one of Skybound’s major properties to life. You will work collaboratively with artists, designers, and engineers to deliver innovative visual features along with high-fidelity characters and environments to our players. You will help guide the team to harness and extend UE5’s features to achieve striking visuals true to art direction and within performance targets.If you are looking for an energetic team with exciting IPs, combat DNA and a drive to deliver breakthrough visuals, this may be the role for you!

Reports: This position will report to the Technical Director

• Lead and mentor a team of technical artists, fostering an enthusiastic and creative environment
• Own and assist hands-on with rigging and skinning of real-time characters
• Collaborate with the Art Director, Tech Director, animators, and artists in establishing robust and efficient art asset pipelines
• Lead the charge in diagnosing, debugging, and brainstorming pipeline issues
• Work across disciplines to ensure the team is building content sustainably and in support of aggressive performance targets while maximizing fidelity
• Establish methods, techniques, tools, and standards to boost the efficiency of the team
• Participate actively in the art review and feedback process to help find creative solutions to achieve results that are faithful to artistic direction and visual targets
• Provide estimates, manage time, and hit deadlines to stay on track with set schedules and tasks
• Mentor, learn from, and share knowledge with others on the team
• Be strategic. Be resourceful. Maximize your impact. Play the game

Requirements:

• 6+ years as a professional character TD, character artist, or rigger
• 3+ years of professional game development experience in Unreal as a technical artist
• Experienced rigging and skinning high-fidelity production game characters
• Expertise in video game asset pipelines and common DCC packages
• Proven ability to build tools and extend major workflows to enable professional art teams
• Working knowledge of Unreal Engine’s asset pipelines
• Self-motivated with excellent researching, problem-solving, and debugging skills
• Strong understanding of game content pipelines
• Experience shipping a product on multiple console or PC platforms
• Prefers a fun, passionate, and team-oriented work environment

Preferred Qualifications:

• AAA game development experience
• Passion for video game development, combat-oriented games, and Skybound IP

Job Type: Regular, Full-Time

Salary Range: $150,000-$170,000

• Actual base salary is dependent on several factors including but not limited to; market dynamics, location and region, experience, specialized skills/training (education), level of responsibility, budgetary considerations, tenure at the company (for current employees), etc.
• The salary range listed is just one component of the total compensation package for employees
• Compensation decisions are dependent on circumstances of each role

Skybound offers a wide array of benefits including medical, dental, vision, life insurance, flexible spending and dependent care accounts, as well as free counseling through our Employee Assistance Program (EAP). We also offer a 401K plan with 4% match, 12 weeks of paid parental leave, generous time off, wellness benefits, and tuition reimbursement.

Company Overview

Skybound is a multiplatform content company working closely with creators and their intellectual properties, extending stories and universes to new platforms, including comics, television, film, tabletop and video games, books, digital content, events, and beyond. We are home to critically-acclaimed global franchises, including The Walking Dead and Invincible.

Skybound Games produces, publishes and distributes video and tabletop games across all genres, including the multi-million-unit selling The Walking Dead video game series. In addition to our wholly-owned franchises, we work with independent developers to foster and create original games with compelling characters and worlds, strong creator and artistic focus, and innovative approaches to engaging genres.

Invincible is one of Skybound's tentpole franchises (celebrating 20 years!) and spans the world of comic books, merchandise, video games, and the critically acclaimed adult animated television series on Prime Video. Now in its second season, the television show has consistently ranked as one of Prime Videos top-streamed series with a 99% score on Rotten Tomatoes. Based on the groundbreaking comic book by Robert Kirkman, Cory Walker, and Ryan Ottley, Invincible revolves around 18-year-old Mark Grayson, who’s just like every other guy his age—except his father is (or was) the most powerful superhero on the planet. Still reeling from Nolan’s betrayal in Season One, Mark struggles to rebuild his life as he faces a host of new threats, all while battling his greatest fear - that he might become his father without even knowing it.

The show stars Steven Yeun, with Sandra Oh, Zazie Beetz, Grey Griffin, Chris Diamantopoulos, Walton Goggins, Gillian Jacobs, Jason Mantzoukas, Ross Marquand, Khary Payton, Zachary Quinto, Andrew Rannells, Kevin Michael Richardson, Seth Rogen, and J.K. Simmons. Executive producers include Skybound's own Kirkman, David Alpert, and Margaret M. Dean.

Equal Opportunity Employer

At Skybound we value diversity and are looking for extraordinary employees of all backgrounds! Skybound is an Equal Opportunity Employer and provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, citizenship, age, genetic information, disability, hair texture or veteran status. In addition to federal law requirements, Skybound complies with all applicable state and local laws governing nondiscrimination.

Skybound will consider applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with the CA Fair Chance Act and Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance