Lead Character Artist (Unreal Engine 5)

Location: Dublin, Ireland (Hybrid)

Company

hirify.global is an Ireland-based AAA game development studio within Virtuos, delivering PC and console game development and art production for major global clients.

What you will do

• Lead, mentor, and develop character artists through regular feedback, one-to-ones, development planning, and clear delegation.
• Plan character-art production with Production, manage capacity and dependencies, and escalate delivery risks early.
• Set quality standards, lead art reviews, and provide actionable feedback in partnership with Art Direction.
• Create and oversee real-time characters, including heads, bodies, clothing, armor, accessories, hair, and related assets.
• Guide assets from concepts, scans, or references through sculpting, modeling, texturing, grooming, optimization, and final Unreal Engine 5 implementation.
• Coordinate with Technical Art, Rigging, Animation, VFX, Lighting, Engineering, sister studios, and clients while maintaining documentation and handover requirements.

Requirements

• Strong professional experience as a Character Artist in game development, including shipped PC and/or console titles and leadership of character-art teams.
• Portfolio demonstrating high-quality real-time characters and current AAA production standards, with strong knowledge of anatomy, likeness, clothing, materials, and hard-surface elements.
• Advanced proficiency with ZBrush, Marvelous Designer, Substance 3D Painter, and Maya, Blender, or 3ds Max.
• Strong production experience with Unreal Engine 5, including materials, skeletal meshes, LODs, Groom, optimization, and performance requirements.
• Practical experience with MetaHuman Creator and the MetaHuman framework, including custom heads, bodies, textures, clothing, hair, facial systems, and DNA-based pipelines.
• Experience with scanning, photogrammetry, scan-data processing, rigging, skinning, deformation, FACS, blend shapes, facial animation, and performance capture.

Nice to have

• Knowledge of current industry trends, tools, and technologies.
• Experience with Houdini and procedural character-production workflows.
• Experience adapting character pipelines across other commercial or proprietary game engines and platforms.

Culture & Benefits

• Flexible work arrangements and a focus on work-life balance.
• Healthcare plan and occupational pension scheme with employer contribution.
• Paid sick leave, wellness leave, subsidised leave, and TaxSaver plans.
• Training and development support, including study support, formal education, international experience, and career progression.
• Relocation support and international mobility opportunities within Virtuos.
• Inclusive, people-oriented culture with opportunities to contribute to major AAA titles.