Lead Technical Artist in Edmonton

Arcanaut Studios is a team of seasoned developers founded on the axiom that creative freedom and independence lead to better, more innovative games. We believe in the power of small, agile teams. We are decision makers with consistent collaboration across disciplines that drive the project vision and create a seamless player experience. Arcanaut Studios is a Canadian company with offices in Edmonton, AB and Kelowna, BC. We offer a flexible work environment combining from-home, in-office, and remote work as well as competitive industry compensation and benefits. By joining us, you will be welcomed into a diverse team of talented developers creating an immersive universe of story, character, and discovery.

As the Lead Technical Artist, you will bridge the game between artistic vision and engineering execution for an ambitious AAA RPG. You will serve as the primary architect of the art pipeline, translating breathtaking concept art into optimized, playable realities within a vast living world. You will be the primary gatekeeper for performance and visual fidelity, ensuring worlds and complex gameplay systems run flawlessly across all platforms. Your role is both visionary and pragmatic as you push the boundaries of modern rendering techniques while ensuring the game remains performant.

Responsibilities:

• Architect and maintain scalable art production pipelines, developing custom tools and scripts to automate workflows and empower artists.
• Author advanced shaders and materials tailored for RPG-specific needs like dynamic weather, foliage and high-fidelity character systems.
• Specialized expertise in Physically Based Rendering techniques to enable realistic and predictable lighting and environments.
• Represent tech-art in cross discipline build reviews, milestone planning and production meetings to set tasks and priorities relevant to goals.
• Evaluate new Unreal Engine features, technologies, tools, and workflows for potential use.
• Profile and resolve GPU/CPU bottlenecks, managing memory and performance budgets without sacrificing the Game Director and Art Director’s intent.
• Provide leadership to the technical art team internally and externally, mentoring and establishing best practices for asset integration and validation.
• Be the key liaison between Art, Design and Engineering to ensure alignment on technical constraints and aesthetic goals.
• Solve complex problems and ambiguous technical challenges.
• Communicate and translate complex technical concepts for non-technical stakeholders.
• Develop and maintain technical art documentation, standards and best practices.

Qualifications and Experience:

• 9+ years in AAA game development with at least one shipped title in a Senior/Lead role.
• Expert level proficiency in Unreal Engine.
• Deep understanding of modern lighting technologies including real-time ray tracing, global illumination, lumen, virtual shadow maps, and mega lights.
• Scripting Mastery with strong foundation in Python, C# and shader languages.
• Advanced skills in industry standard software such as Maya, Houdini and Adobe Substance Suite.
• Strong knowledge of profiling tools such as Unreal Insights, RenderDoc, PIX and GPU debugging workflows.
• Experience working with external development partners and distributed teams.
• Experience with procedural content generation for building large scale environments.
• Exceptional cross discipline communication.
• Proactive problem solving.

Benefits:

We offer a rewards package to help you live your best life while doing your best work, including medical and dental coverage, retirement savings contributions and a Flex Benefit program that has a wide array of coverage to best fit your personal situation. We offer 3 weeks of vacation per year in addition to summer and winter studio breaks that are each two weeks long. The hiring range for this position is $140,000 – $195,000 in addition to a bi-yearly performance-based bonus. The base pay may vary depending on the candidate’s region, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience.