Senior Technical Artist

Your Platform

Located in Toronto Cananda, Guildford UK, the San Francisco Bay Area and Melbourne, Australia – we’re the videogame development team behind Call of Duty®: Modern Warfare 3, Call of Duty®: Advanced Warfare and Call of Duty®: WWII. Since our founding in 2009, our greatest passion has been making AAA games. The strength of our team makes us not only excellent at what we do, but also how we do it. We firmly believe in supporting our talented employees to be the best they can be. Here at Sledgehammer Games, everyone is a game maker.

As we head into decade II of development, we’re focused on constantly evolving, innovating and taking risks – which are some of the most rewarding aspects of game development. With world-class audio, design, engineering and art teams, we’ve been able to achieve some of the highest-quality game execution of any studio in the industry. We love what we do and work hard to make sure that each new game we make is even better than the last. Creativity is key, and we’re looking for talented game developers for our exciting next project.

Sledgehammer Games is wholly owned by Activision. To learn more about our studio, please visit us at www.sledgehammergames.com or search for Sledgehammer Games on your favorite social media platform. Want to hear what it’s like at the studio directly from current employees? Check out our #LifeatSHG developer profiles: https://youtu.be/12DUBszg-w4

Your Mission

As a Senior Technical Artist you will work as part of our cross-trained tech art team to build, deliver and support art tools, workflows and assets that enable artists and designers to quickly integrate quality content and features into our games. A Technical Artist should have a strong eye for art quality and knowledge of real-time graphics pipelines. He or she will act as a bridge between art and engineering demonstrating superior communication skills to facilitate problem solving between departments. This candidate will be a technical resource for all phases of production while continually improving our content pipeline. Ideal candidates should be able to apply their ideas, techniques and experience using the latest technologies to create world-class game content.  Experience and creativity in the art and science of rigging, animation, automation, and proceduralism are important for this role.

Priorities can often change in a fast-paced environment like ours, so this role includes, but is not limited to, the following responsibilities:   

• Collaborate across disciplines to improve studio tools and pipelines 

• Generate master materials and shading networks in Unreal and iterate with engineers on fixes, improvements and alterations as the assets are applied to the game 

• Proactively identify problems, propose solutions and work fluidly with other team members 

• Push the graphical limitations of our engine, maintain frame rate requirements, and deliver content within memory and disk footprint budgets 

• Create tools and processes that facilitate content authoring with an emphasis on user experience, quality and productivity 

Player Profile

Minimum Requirements:

• Understanding of one or more commercially available real-time engines 

• Experience in the following domains: game export frameworks, asset pipeline, and workflow design, shading and look development

• Familiarity with Maya, its API, and other industry leading applications 

• Experience with art tool deployment strategy 

• Ability to trouble shoot problems and support artists in getting their work done 

• Excellent communication skills, especially with regards to illustrating technical processes 

• Facility with modern scripting languages 

Extra Points:

• If you are a tenacious, resourceful, tech savvy person with a willingness to grow, we want to hear from you regardless of your qualifications

• C++, Python, C# experience 

• Knowledge of HLSL, GLSL or other shading languages

• Experience with node-based shader creation in Unreal or another engine

• Experience with continuous-delivery game pipelines 

• Examples of professional work (e.g. art, scripts, tools, simulations, etc.) 

• Understanding of coding best practices and efficiency 

• Has trained or mentored others 

Our World

At Activision, we strive to create the most iconic brands in gaming and entertainment. We’re driven by our mission to deliver unrivaled gaming experiences for the world to enjoy, together. We are home to some of the most beloved entertainment franchises including Call of Duty®, Crash Bandicoot™, Tony Hawk’s™ Pro Skater™, and Guitar Hero®. As a leading worldwide developer, publisher and distributor of interactive entertainment and products, our “press start” is simple: delight hundreds of millions of players around the world with innovative, fun, thrilling, and engaging entertainment experiences.

We’re not just looking back at our decades-long legacy; we’re forging ahead to keep advancing gameplay with some of the most popular titles and sophisticated technology in the world. We have bold ambitions to create the most inclusive company as we know our success comes from the passionate, creative, and diverse teams within our organization.

We’re in the business of delivering fun and unforgettable entertainment for our player community to enjoy. And our future opportunities have never been greater — this could be your opportunity to level up.

Ready to Activate Your Future?

The videogame industry and therefore our business is fast-paced and will continue to evolve. As such, the duties and responsibilities of this role may be changed as directed by the Company at any time to promote and support our business and relationships with industry partners.

We love hearing from anyone who is enthusiastic about changing the games industry. Not sure you meet all qualifications? Let us decide! Research shows that women and members of other under-represented groups tend to not apply to jobs when they think they may not meet every qualification, when, in fact, they often do! We are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment and strongly encourage you to apply.

We are committed to working with and providing reasonable assistance to individuals with physical and mental disabilities. If you are a disabled individual requiring an accommodation to apply for an open position, please email your request to accommodationrequests@activisionblizzard.com. General employment questions cannot be accepted or processed here. Thank you for your interest.

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status, among other characteristics.