Character Artist (Contract)

Join the award-winning team that created God of War

Santa Monica Studio is seeking a Character Artist to help us build a new unannounced title!

As a member of the Character Art Team, you will help us support the various needs of our cast – from 3D modeling and sculpting to texture painting to material setup / UV layout as well as setup and content integration. We are looking for you to learn from the industry’s premier talent in art and tech while applying your skills in high poly sculpting, modeling, textures, as well as hair and groom.

The ideal candidate has a portfolio showcasing compelling character designs that demonstrate strong fundamentals in anatomy, sculpting and texturing. Additional experience with game content pipelines and any process-related content that demonstrates your workflow are highly recommended.

Responsibilities

• Contribute to a variety of character art tasks listed above to help us reach our visual standards for the product
• Maintain a good knowledge of the game’s design to facilitate communication and enable early identification of issues
• May serve as an artistic resource for overall product or studio needs - this includes conducting general research, testing new systems or tools, techniques, integrating content, and task overflow
• Facilitate requests or information needs regarding any aspect of the character art creation process as requested
• Capable of resolving a moderate range of artistic development issues for both artists as well as other team members
• Possess strong time management and prioritization skills - this entails collaborating with the Production group to coordinate task lists to ensure assignments are progressing as expected according to schedules, milestones and overall project goals
• Clearly communicate updates and properly escalate concerns to the appropriate team member(s) and manager(s)
• Actively improves skill set and abilities by keeping aware of industry trends and techniques, evaluating competitive products, learning new software packages and traditional art methods

Requirements

• 2+ years of experience as a 3D Character Artist
• Traditional Fine Art Skills with an emphasis on scale, anatomy, composition, color theory, 2D/3D design
• Understanding of Industry Standard Software such as Maya, Photoshop, ZBrush, and Texture Creation/Material Editing (Substance Painter/Designer)
• Familiarity with video game development including, but not limited to workflow, tools, lighting, high and low poly modeling, texture painting, PBR material setup, UV layout, and engine parameters/optimizations
• Possess strong time management and prioritization skills
• Good communication, organizational, and interpersonal skills

Preferred Experience

• 1 or more published titles

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