Sr Pipeline Technical Director

What You’ll Do

● Develop pipeline and asset management tools to meet immediate, show-directed production demands, ensuring facility-wide consistency as directed by show and technical supervisors. Help maintain a wide array of existing workflows and scripts.

● Provide front-line production support across a wide range of disciplines, troubleshoot assets and shots, and help artists with general problem-solving. Monitor email requests, package up problems and redirect to the appropriate engineering team.

● Test and validate tools and techniques in production. Work closely with engineering teams in testing and releasing new and modified software systems.

● Act as an on-call resource for show production staff.

● Work effectively with artists, production supervisors, and technical staff across ILM studios in San Francisco, Vancouver, Singapore, and London.

● When not crewed to shows, serve on software teams working on projects that improve the efficiency of asset setup, caching, and shot-data handoff between artists across the entire pipeline.

● Drive pipeline priorities in conjunction with show supervisors.

● Work on tools of greatest complexity and sophistication, requiring the broadest knowledge of the larger pipeline and facility needs.

● Assist other Pipeline TDs in providing front-line assistance for the most complex of end-user problems; guide engineering teams in debugging technical issues and eliminating root causes of problems.

● Develop comprehensive knowledge of software and systems; drive the development and evolution of standards and conventions used in production.

● Update documentation for the pipeline and tools to reflect any changes that are made.

What We’re Looking For

● Demonstrated experience developing and maintaining tools for use in a computer graphics environment.

● At least 8 years production experience in visual effects for film, commercials or television.

● Required Skills/Competencies

● Proficiency in Linux

● Advanced Python scripting required

● Proficient in one or more of Maya, Nuke, Houdini, Mari, Katana, RenderMan or similar

● Ability to communicate cross-discipline and provide innovative solutions to pipeline issues

● Detail oriented and strong self-sufficient troubleshooter

● Comprehensive knowledge of the entire visual effects process, from shooting to modeling and texturing, animation, rendering and compositing

Preferred Skills/Competencies

● Bachelor’s degree or equivalent in Computer Science or a related technical field

● Experience with production database systems

● Experience with C, C++

● Experience with Windows development and applications such as 3ds max a plus.