Freelance Associate Creative Director, Art

3 Hours ago • 6 Years + • Art

Job Summary

Job Description

As an Associate Creative Director (Art), you will be responsible for conceptualizing and executing creative ideas across various campaign formats, with a strong emphasis on video and storytelling. You will partner with a copywriter, production teams, and account leads to shape the visual direction of campaigns. This role requires strong art direction skills, including guiding casting, locations, lighting, and editing. You will present work internally and to clients, collaborate with production partners to ensure a high level of polish, and manage projects across different mediums like video, digital, print, and OOH. The ideal candidate will have experience in brand and retail messaging coexistence, with automotive experience being a plus. Adaptability to feedback and priorities, along with fostering visual excellence, is crucial.
Must have:
  • 6+ years in art direction/design
  • Portfolio with sharp visual ideas
  • Experience across video, digital, print, OOH
  • Knowledge of production process
  • Strong visual storytelling skills
  • Good presentation skills
Good to have:
  • Automotive experience
  • Experience where brand and retail messaging coexist

Job Details

As an Associate Creative Director (Art), you bring strong conceptual thinking and confident visual direction to campaign work. You know how to take an insight and build an idea that holds across formats—especially video. While you understand layout and design fundamentals, your focus is on art direction: shaping how a campaign looks, feels, and moves. Automotive experience is a plus.

You work fluidly with a copy partner, production teams, and account discipline leads. You're able to communicate your vision clearly and guide others to bring it to life—whether that’s through casting, locations, lighting references, or edit flow and timing, music & voiceover direction. You move fast, stay collaborative, and keep the creative sharp.


You Will:

  • Concept and execute creative ideas across video, digital, and print campaigns
  • Partner with your copy counterpart to bring insight-led, channel-smart thinking to life
  • Lead the art direction on integrated campaigns, with a focus on video and storytelling
  • Present work internally and to clients in a clear, visually driven way
  • Collaborate with production partners—ECDs, CDs, directors, editors, animators—to bring work to a high level of polish
  • Move between brand-led and retail-driven projects with confidence
  • Work closely with strategy and account leads to ensure the creative stays on track and on brief
  • Adjust quickly to feedback and shifting priorities
  • Foster a culture of visual excellence, craft, and accountability

You Have:

  • 6+ years of experience in art direction or design
  • A portfolio that shows sharp visual ideas across video and integrated work
  • Confidence in working across a range of mediums—video, digital, print, and OOH
  • A working knowledge of production—from pre-pro to color grade
  • Solid instincts around visual storytelling, branding, and how to direct execution
  • Strong presentation skills and the ability to sell in visual thinking
  • Experience in automotive or other category where brand and retail messaging coexist is a bonus

Critical Mass is an equal opportunity employer. 

The Critical Mass Talent Acquisition team will only communicate from email addresses that use the URLs criticalmass.com and us.greenhouse-mail.io. We will not use apps such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, or Google Hangouts for communicating with you. We will never ask you to send us money, technology, or anything else to work for our company. If you believe you are the victim of a scam, please review your local government consumer protections guidance and reach out to them directly.

If U.S. based: https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/job-scams#avoid
If Canada based: https://www.canada.ca/en/services/finance/consumer-affairs.html
If U.K. based: https://www.gov.uk/consumer-protection-rights
If Costa Rica based: https://www.consumo.go.cr/educacion_consumidor/consejos_practicos.aspx 

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About The Company

Critical Mass is a team of 1,800 inspired folks based in 12 offices around the world, providing full-service digital capabilities for the greatest brands on Earth. Our secret sauce is our uncompromising design standards, our relentless focus on customers, and an ability to put powerful new technologies to work for our clients.


We work with the best—Apple, Nike, Mars Wrigley, Nissan, Diageo, Airbnb, BMW, BNY Mellon, Johnson & Johnson, and many more—brands who strive for connected digital ecosystems and unparalleled experiences. We help them get there by gaining deep insight into their consumers and orchestrating data, AI, design, media, and tech stacks around human stories.


We’re a global agency founded in Canada, but digital is our home. If you know us, then you know we’re a special, quirky place that attracts big talent and tiny egos. (We actually give out a “so f-n nice” award—lots of them). But just because we’re friendly doesn’t mean we’re not a force to be reckoned with. We’re driven. Relentless. And we live our values. We’re Critical Mass, but our friends call us CM. Please call us CM!

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