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We craft games that weave pulse-pounding thrill with the warmth of belonging.
The Role
Bonfire Studios is looking for a Senior Technical Artist to join our team! If you’re passionate about blending art and technology to empower artists and create exceptional gaming experiences, we’d love to talk with you. At Bonfire, you’ll have the unique opportunity to define your role on Arkheron, our first game and a brand-new IP, while helping to shape the foundation of our art pipeline. As a key influencer, you’ll be the essential bridge connecting our artists, designers, and engineers.
We’re an excellence-driven studio that values curiosity, lifelong learning, and collaboration. Here, you’ll have the freedom to research new techniques, drive pipeline innovation, and advance art development processes in meaningful ways.
What You’ll Do:
- Create and maintain high-quality character rigs and procedural animations in Maya and Unity, working closely with animators to iterate on character design and bring characters to life.
- Develop and maintain Maya tooling with autonomy, managing the pipeline from DCC (Digital Content Creation) to in-game implementation.
- Identify opportunities to empower artists through tooling, building scalable solutions and automation strategies.
- Collaborate across disciplines—art, design, and engineering—to iterate on asset creation and management.
- Champion new ideas to elevate visual quality and improve technology.
- Guide outsourcing partners during skinning and deformation reviews, ensuring high visual standards.
We’d Love to See:
- 5+ years as a Technical Artist in games.
- Expertise in Maya, Python, and Qt (C# experience is a bonus).
- Proactive development of pipelines and tools.
- Unity experience is great—but not required! If you’re new to Unity, you’re excited about learning it!
- Familiarity with real-time rendering, shader writing, and graphics performance is a plus, but not essential for this role.
- Experience with live game support pipelines is helpful, but not a requirement.
What’s Not a Fit:
- If you’re primarily focused on concept art, 2D design, or animation-only roles: this position is centered on technical art development and pipelines.
- If you’re more comfortable in highly structured, hierarchical environments: Bonfire is collaborative and self-directed, with opportunities to shape your role.
- If you prefer working exclusively with one part of the pipeline: this role thrives on cross-functional collaboration and ownership across multiple disciplines.
Why You’ll Love Bonfire:
- Openness and humility: We value curiosity, peer support, and tackling challenges together.
- Collaborative, non-hierarchical culture: Everyone has a voice, and you can shape your role to have a big impact.
- Belief in iteration: We know that great games come from constant improvement—and that great tools make the difference.
- People first: We believe great games are made by great teams, and we’re committed to supporting each other every step of the way.
- Passion for player experiences: Our goal is to empower developers and create unforgettable experiences for players.
The base salary for this position as a Senior is $196,500 annually. If your experience is more (principal level) or less (mid-level), your salary will be more/less than that rate (based on market data). We consider candidates' potential impact holistically, not just their years of experience or skill level. There is also more to our total comp package than salary, we offer equity to every new hire as well as a comprehensive benefits package and more. We will be happy to share more about our compensation opportunities when we chat with you!
You can learn more about Bonfire's studio culture, team, benefits, and perks on our website: www.bonfirestudios.com. Any information you submit is used for recruiting purposes only, and is never shared. You can learn more in our privacy policy.
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The Company
What We Do
Bonfire Studios is an independent video game developer focused on crafting games that weave pulse-pounding thrill with the warmth of belonging. We are founded on the belief that great games are born from lean teams of talented craftspeople who dream big and build with passion. Our first title, Arkheron, is a team-based PvP game currently in a private playtesting phase of development. Our design philosophy centers on fun and deeply rewarding gameplay, imaginary worlds that inspire self-expression, welcoming, long-lasting communities and experiences that become a meaningful part of players’ lives. Landing a role with us isn’t just about joining a team; it’s about pulling up a chair around our bonfire. All of our roles offer a hybrid work experience, but we thrive on in-person collaboration and gatherings at our Irvine, California office.
