VFX Groom Technical Director

General Summary
The VFX Groom Technical Director (TD) works with creative and technical leadership to empower artists to achieve the artistic vision of the show, matching real world puppet hair styling and performance. This position will work with CG Supervisors and Asset Leads to implement and support workflows and tools in service of the artistic vision, triage and fix technical problems encountered by artists, and maintain clear and concise workflow documentation. 

Job Functions 

• Design, develop, and refine Houdini digital assets and tools to help artists achieve their artistic goals, as defined by the creative supervisors on the show, under the guidance of technical leadership.
• Collaborate closely with the Groom team to ensure that technical challenges and bugs are addressed promptly.
• Liaise with other VFX departments including Modeling, Rigging, Surfacing, Animation, and Lighting to ensure that the produced groom artifacts function properly throughout the pipeline.
• Assist Asset Leads with mentoring, training, and developing team members within the VFX department.
• Participate in regular development meetings led by the Digital Pipeline Manager and technical leadership.
• Participate in periodic code reviews with the technical team, led by the Digital Pipeline Manager and technical leadership.
• Break down assigned work into actionable tasks, maintaining and refining relevant technical documentation and tickets.
• Work with technical leadership to communicate development schedules and timelines with production and artistic leadership. 

Qualifications 

• 5+ years of related experience in film, preferably in motion picture computer graphics.
• Expertise in Houdini’s technical and creative toolset, with an emphasis on groom related ops.
• Expertise in coding in Python, including familiarity with modern best practices, knowledge of the Python Standard Library, and other industry standard libraries such as PySide/PyQt, PyYaml, Pytest, etc.
• Expertise in with Houdini’s domain specific languages, including VEX and Hscript.
• Experience with C++ and Houdini’s C++ APIs, a plus. 

Physical Demands and Work Environment
The physical demands and work environment characteristics described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. 

• Physical demands: While performing the duties of this job, the employee is required to walk; stand; sit; use hands to operate standard office equipment; reach with hands and arms; balance; stoop; talk or hear both in person and by telephone. The employee must lift and/or move up to 15 pounds. Vision abilities include close vision, distance vision, and the ability to adjust focus.
• Work environment: While performing the duties of this job, the employee works under typical office conditions and is exposed to variable indoor temperatures. The noise level is usually quiet or moderate.  

Location 
On-site in Hillsboro, OR 
Salary 
Salary is commensurate with skills and experience.
Disclaimer
The above statements are intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by people assigned to this classification. They are not intended to be construed as an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, duties and skills required of personnel so classified.

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