Principal Environment Concept Artist

Riot Games was established in 2006 by entrepreneurial gamers who believe that player-focused game development can result in great games. In 2009, Riot released its debut title League of Legends to critical and player acclaim. As the most played video game in the world, over 100 million play every month. Players form the foundation of our community and it’s for them that we continue to evolve and improve the League of Legends experience.

We’re looking for humble but ambitious, razor-sharp professionals who can teach us a thing or two. We promise to return the favor. Like us, you take play seriously; you’re passionate about games. We embrace those who see things differently, aren’t afraid to experiment, and who have a healthy disregard for constraints.

That's where you come in.

As a Principal Environment Concept Artist on a Research & Development project you lead the project forward by working closely with Creative and Art leadership to develop visual explorations for early game prototypes that define the promise of our game thesis and build organizational confidence in our project to facilitate efficient progress through the R&D development cycle through to global launch. Serving as a Environment Concept Art lead, you will work closely with other concept artists and the greater art team to set a fresh new Art Style for the game, establish genre-defining visual quality bars as well as define innovative cinematic narrative experiences for our target players. You will also work in close collaboration with game designers, writers and producers to bring new worlds and characters to life that are well tuned for the world of Runeterra and the League of Legends IP.

We are seeking a highly experienced environment concept artist with diverse and considerable experience driving new art styles and visual look prototypes for early game development in a hands-on manner. You will employ your expert level skills and deep understanding of concept art craft to lead the concept exploration as well as guiding team-wide 3D look development that is supported by Insights data and regular player testing based on goals and timelines set by Product & Art Leadership. You are an independent leader as well as a hands-on workhorse counted on to generate visual solutions for game concepts and world-building that will help guide the project forward, setting a high-bar for 2D and 3D art for our project that also supports Art Slice prototypes that the project will be using for gameplay validation. As a senior member of the team, you will help mentor your fellow team members to continue to raise the quality bar at the studio, as well as surfacing development challenges and project needs in order to help us consider future art staffing as well as outsource and contractor solutions.

Responsibilities:

• Collaborate closely with the Creative Director, Art Lead, and other concept artists to produce high quality concept designs that define the creative & visual direction for the game based on timeline and goals set by product leadership.

• Lead both internal and external environment concept team with hands-on craft to explore, iterate and define character concept targets to build confidence in our stylistic explorations and later visual targets.

• Create high concept scene visual arts and environment illustrations that can align leadership and the team towards a clear visual direction and execution in 3D based on our desired player experience.

• Leverage world building knowledge and expertise to push environmental limits while maintaining clear art direction and visual consistency

• Create world-building concepts to broaden the visual languages and diversity of styles within our game to envision and drive future game content

• Create thumbnails, sketches, rendered concepts and production turn-arounds to help facilitate asset production and outsourcing, providing feedback, paintovers and notes as needed

• Execute paintovers over 3D blockouts that help further visual direction and visual fidelity of vertical slice assets and future production levels.

• Work with Art Leadership to develop and define a consistent visual style while working across the art team and across disciplines to maintain cohesive project-wide art execution as well as efficient concept-3D execution that flows through development pipelines.

• Mentor and train more junior artists on the team, providing and receiving clear feedback that allows for clear creative goals and outcomes that are well understood by the concept and greater art team.

• Help us manage outsourcing and contractor solutions, as well as explore new technologies and production techniques that can help us maintain an edge of efficiency in line with evolving industry standards.

Required Qualifications

• 10+ years of professional experience working in concept art for gaming or equivalent industries.

• Expert proficiency in Photoshop and other relevant concept art tools.

• Expert proficiency in executing concept art fundamentals such as composition, design, color and perspective.

• Multiple shipped mobile or AAA game titles.

• Deep experience working in full game development cycles from early art exploration and prototype phases through to ship/live.

• Strong understanding of Hero-collector games and character-focused ARPG sensibilities.

Don’t forget to include a resume and cover letter. We receive a lot of applications, but we’ll notice a fun, well-written intro that shows us you take play seriously.