Lead Lighting Artist

Overview

The Lead Lighting Artist is responsible for overseeing the lighting of 3D scenes and environments to achieve the desired visual style, mood, and atmosphere in animation, visual effects (VFX), or video game productions. This role involves leading a team of lighting artists, developing efficient lighting techniques, and ensuring that the lighting enhances the overall narrative, realism, or stylistic choices of the project. The Lead Lighting Artist works closely with directors, art directors, and other department leads to ensure visual consistency and technical accuracy across all shots.

Key Responsibilities

• Oversee the creation and execution of lighting setups that align with the artistic vision and technical requirements of the project.
• Ensure that lighting setups achieve the desired level of realism or stylization, depending on the project’s visual goals. Supervise and refine the lighting passes to ensure consistency, quality, and continuity across all shots.
• Rendering shots (either digitally integrated VFX or full CG) including non-lighting passes required by other departments
• Compile all upstream elements such as environments, animation, simulation, and FX caches and work with compositors to final shots.
• Create or implement light rigs from either on set reference or concept art.
• Navigate and use previous setups for sequences, to develop or match key shots. Management of volumetric light setups, including shadowing and cucoloris development.
• Creating efficient rendering setups in order to optimize render farm usage. Wrangling assets or elements of a shot from another department to ensure shots are completed to schedule.
• Lead, mentor, and guide a team of lighting artists, providing feedback and support to ensure high-quality work.
• Assign tasks, set priorities, and manage the workflow of the lighting team to ensure that deadlines are met without compromising artistic or technical quality.
• Conduct regular reviews of the team’s work, providing constructive feedback to ensure that the lighting aligns with the director’s vision.
• Collaborate closely with the art CG supervisor, and other department leads to ensure cohesive integration of lighting with other elements of the production.
• Collaborate with the look dev team to ensure that lighting setups are aligned with the shaders, materials, and textures used in the project.
• Ensure that the lighting integrates well with other rendering passes, such as shadows, reflections, and ambient occlusion, to achieve the highest level of realism or stylistic coherence.
  
  

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Animation/Visual Effects, Computer Graphics, or a related field (or equivalent work experience).
• Minimum of 5 years of experience as a lighting artist in animation, visual effects with demonstrated experience leading a lighting team.
• A portfolio or demo reel showcasing advanced lighting work, with examples of complex lighting setups, mood, and atmosphere.
• Experience working on high-end film, television, or AAA game productions is highly preferred.
• Proficient in industry-standard lighting and rendering software such as Maya, Houdini, Blender, Arnold, V-Ray, Renderman, or similar tools.
• Strong understanding of lighting principles, including global illumination, physically-based rendering, shadow casting, and color theory.
• Solid knowledge of **compositing software** (e.g., Nuke, After Effects) to ensure seamless integration of lighting passes into the final shot.
• Experience with **real-time rendering engines** (e.g., Unreal Engine, Unity) is a plus, particularly for interactive or virtual production workflows.
• Knowledge of scripting languages (e.g., Python, MEL) for automating or enhancing lighting workflows is beneficial.
  
  

The Lead Lighting Artist is integral to achieving the desired visual quality of a project, ensuring that lighting contributes to the storytelling, mood, and technical demands of each production, while also leading and inspiring a team of lighting artists.