Lead Tech Artist

Saltwater Games is a creative alliance of studios dedicated to delivering unparalleled entertainment experiences that ignite the imagination of our audiences. Our passionate teams of creative professionals consist of industry veterans from renowned studios such as PlayStation, Codemasters, Sumo Digital, Interior Night and Mediatonic who are working on some exciting VR, multiplayer and mobile titles. At SWG we follow some key values:

• We are optimistic & brave
• We are honest & open
•  We take ownership & responsibility

ABOUT YOU:

Saltwater Games is currently in search of an experienced Tech Artist to join our fully remote team balancing project requirements and line management of a small number of other tech artists. You will be a key member of the team, liaising with the design, art and engineering teams to help create visually stunning and performant games. Ideally you are a generalist who is happy to get their hands dirty in-engine, getting involved with multiple areas including Shaders, Animation systems, Tools pipelines and many more. You will be actively looking for ways to innovate, striving to always improve the quality of our games and our pipelines used across the studio. 

ROLE AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Work with both the Art and Programming teams to ensure our games look great and perform well on the wide variety of VR, Mobile and Console Platforms in the market.
• Work inside Unity to create performant Shaders, beautiful VFX and helpful tools.
• Perform research and create innovative solutions using state of the art techniques.
• Provide mentoring and training for our Tech Art team and support the wider art team.
• Provide feedback and critique to both artists and engineers to improve quality and efficiency.
• Create documentation and specifications for other departments.
• Identify and optimise pipeline inefficiencies and propose new tool ideas and workflows where required.
• Identify and implement workflow improvements, taking into account the needs of each project and the studio as a whole.
• Prioritise your workload as problems arise, balancing the urgency of daily issues with larger ongoing projects.
• Help to troubleshoot problem situations across the board.

• 5+ years of professional experience.
• A deep understanding of Unity3D.
• Experience on several modern platforms and working on multi-platform projects.
• Have contributed to at least two shipped commercial titles on console, mobile or PC.
• Experience creating performant, optimised Shaders in Unity.
• A strong understanding of modern Version Control systems (particularly Git).
• Experience working with packages such as Maya, Motionbuilder, Houdini and EmberGen.
• Experience with C# and scripting languages such as Python.
• Line Management experience.
• You are comfortable with the Universal Render Pipeline and how Unity’s scriptable render pipeline works.
• Ideally, you should have some familiarity with Digital Asset Management tools and understand how to integrate these with our pipeline.
• You are a great communicator who can comfortably talk to colleagues across all disciplines.
• You are willing to get stuck in when help is needed, keeping the team moving forward at all times.

• Salary £50-65k
• Remote-first Studio
• Unlimited holidays
• Monthly workplace well-being benefit scheme
• Regular team social events & studio summits 
• Working alongside a friendly, flexible, and highly talented team
• Opportunity to work on big-name IPs

To tell better stories and create inclusive experiences we welcome everyone, especially from under-represented people in our industry whose stories aren’t told often enough. Our research has suggested that sometimes people from underrepresented groups are less likely to apply to roles unless they meet every single listed requirement. At Saltwater Games we are dedicated to building a diverse and inclusive working environment, who you are will always deserve our consideration and recognition, and your application is welcome.