Senior Technical Animator (Gamedev)

TL;DR

Senior Technical Animator (Gamedev): Designing and maintaining animation systems and tools within Unreal Engine for a hit indie horror game, focusing on high-quality character movement and performance. Focus on optimizing animation assets for performance, memory, and runtime stability, and mentoring junior technical animators.

Location: United States

Company

hirify.global is a mid-sized game studio focused on crafting memorable, atmospheric, and emotionally impactful gameplay experiences.

What you will do

• Develop and maintain animation systems, rigs, automated lip sync systems, and runtime solutions within the game engine.
• Build tools and pipelines that improve the efficiency of animation workflows.
• Collaborate with animators to ensure rigs, skeletons, and animation assets perform optimally in-game.
• Work with gameplay engineers to integrate animation features and systems.
• Optimize animation assets for performance, memory, and runtime stability.
• Establish and document best practices for animation pipelines and technical workflows.

Requirements

• 5+ years of experience in technical animation or rigging within the video game industry.
• Strong experience with Unreal Engine game engine.
• Proficiency with Maya or similar DCC tools, including rigging and scripting workflows.
• Experience working with animation state machines, blend trees, and runtime animation systems.
• Understanding of character rigging, skinning, and deformation systems.
• Familiarity with Python, MEL, C++, or Blueprint scripting for tool and pipeline development.

Nice to have

• Experience with motion capture pipelines and retargeting systems.
• Knowledge of rigging with unreal tooling, procedural animation with control rig, physics-based animation, or IK systems.
• Experience optimizing animation for console or PC performance constraints.
• Shipped at least one AAA or mid-sized studio game title.

Culture & Benefits

• Equal opportunity employer.
• Employment decisions are based on merit, business needs, and role requirements.