Module Artist (Contract)

 Join the award-winning team that created God of War

Santa Monica Studio is seeking a Module Artist for the development of a new unannounced title!

This is an opportunity to contribute to the artistic vision and development of a product with a specialized focus on creating environments and level assets.

As a Module Artist, you will effectively collaborate with a wide range of development team members outside of your direct discipline, such as the Art Director, Art Leads, Designers, Technical Artists, Animators, Programmers and Producers, to optimally achieve artistic goals and implementation as they relate to design and technological considerations. 

Responsibilities

• Create fully functional assets which can be shared across the project and respect the technical and artistic constraints, according to defined quality standards, artistic styles, conceptual designs, development pipelines, technical parameters, and production goals
• Work closely with Gameplay, Systems Design, and Animation departments to ensure interactable modules are functioning as intended
• Create hard-surface and organic assets including foliage
• Integrate the produced elements, objects, and textures into the levels
• Demonstrates the ability to develop a comprehensive knowledge of the art production pipeline and all engine features, tools, and systems associated with the creation of art assets
• Maintains the artistic goals and vision through all phases of the game development cycle from pre-production through final product release – this entails ensuring Module assets are of the highest artistic quality and uphold the integrity of the game's design and artistic vision of the game
• Support the Lead Environment Artist in any ad hoc tasks and duties
• Facilitates requests or info needs regarding any aspect of the environment/level Module creation process as needed
• Actively improves skill set and abilities by keeping aware of industry trends and techniques, evaluating competitive products, learning new software packages and traditional art methods
• Possesses strong time management and prioritization skills – this entails collaborating with Production group to develop task lists to ensure assignments are progressing in alignment with schedules, milestones, and overall project goals
• Clearly communicates updates and properly escalate concerns to the appropriate team member(s) and manager(s)

Requirements

• Minimum 1-3 years of industry experience or related experience
• Strong traditional fine art skills, training, and production experience (illustration, painting, organic forms, color theory, perspective, 2D & 3D design.)
• Proficient in the use of Maya, (or 3D modeling package) Zbrush, and Substance Designer and Painter
• Proficiency in creating a wide variety of asset types including organic, hard-surface, foliage, and other Module that may need to be skinned, rigged, and animated
• Familiarity with video game product development including, but not limited to workflow, tools, lighting, high and low poly modeling, texture painting, particle systems, UV layout, in-game animation, material setup, layout, VFX and engine parameters/optimizations
• Having experience in basic character creation workflows as they relate to modeling, skinning, rigging, and animation is a plus
• Excellent communication, organizational, time management, and interpersonal skills
• Works under minimal direction to determine and develop an approach to solutions. Specifically, this will mean contacting departments outside of art to obtain information and resources and providing updates and findings to those departments
• A bachelor's in fine arts or relevant curriculum or equivalent skill set 

Preferred Experience

• Working experience on one or more published titles
• Previous or current-gen video game platform experience

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