BC - Senior Look Dev Artist - Environments - Stop Motion VFX Project

Senior Look Development Artist - Environments

All applicants must be residents of British Columbia, Canada.
Must be legally entitled to work in Canada ie. Citizen, PR, Open Work Permit.

At this time, we’re pleased to offer this role as an option to work from home OR work from our Vancouver studio in the beautiful Gastown area, close to the Waterfront Station in Downtown. (Remote is not available outside of BC; there is no hybrid)

About Zoic 
Zoic Studios is a Visual Effects company that specializes in high end visual effects for television, film, and advertising. Our mantra is Visual Evolution - we focus on every part of the process, from the final picture to the pipeline used to create them.   

Are you looking for your next creative and technical challenge? Come join our team!  

Why Join Zoic? 

• We are an Artist owned and operated VFX studio. 
• We love what we do and always stay curious about new technology and techniques. 
• We respect work/life balance in a hectic industry. 
• We work with a team from all walks of life and backgrounds. 

We are excited to share an incredible stop-motion animated feature project that promises creativity, collaboration, and a fantastic chance to showcase your skills! 

Summary of Position

The Sr CG Environment Look Development Artist is responsible for generating textures and surfaces in the production of high quality, accurate, photo-real, and stylized CG character and environment assets.  

Job Functions

• Digitally create and implement CG assets for stop motion visual effects, ensuring color and surfacing of CG assets reflect the vision and requirements of the given project. 
• Create and refine materials to achieve the final look of environment assets and terrain, and build custom looks and materials for specialty assets. 
• Build and maintain show shading networks, master materials, and templates to support CG artists with final look development. 
• Work within a physically-based shading context, balancing and validating material responses across multiple assets. 
• Work alongside the Lead CG Look Dev Artist to ensure that assets and terrains and shots meet show standards. 
• Work with the Environments team to address supervisors' and directors' shading notes and provide training, as needed. 
• Support workflows for publishing and moving data between assets and lighting. 
• Troubleshoot production problems, such as common rendering and lighting technical issues, and create methods to minimize their impact. 
• Assist in the development of new tools and techniques to improve the asset development process. 

Qualifications 

• 5+ years' experience in live-action or photoreal feature film production. 
• Advanced Katana experience. 
• Proficient in Renderman (or equivalent), Mari, and Substance Painter and Designer. 
• Experience working in a USD pipeline. 
• Proficient Look Development, R&D, and lighting skills from both an artistic and technical perspective. 
• Strong aesthetic sense and keen eye for detail. 
• Technical understanding of color space. 
• Efficient UV layout experience using a UDIM workflow. 
• Basic compositing skills in Nuke. 
• Strong communication, organizational, and time management skills to balance priorities under the pressure of a deadline-driven production. 
• Ability to take direction and implement feedback. 
• Basic understanding of plate and image-based lighting, as well as full CG lighting, preferred. 
• Basic understanding of multi-pass rendering and 3D scene layout, preferred.
• Houdini, Maya, and Zbrush knowledge, a plus. 

Additional information

• British Columbia Employees Pay Range: $45 - $65 (The actual base salary offered will depend on a variety of factors, including without limitation, the qualifications of the individual applicant for the position, years of relevant experience, level of education attained, certifications or other professional licenses held, and if applicable, the location of the position)
• Zoic does not cover relocation costs.
• Any and all WFH positions require the candidate to have a reliable internet connection via ethernet and work on Pacific Standard Time.
• This job description contains the basic requirements for the position and is NOT intended to be a complete list of responsibilities; other duties may be assigned.
• Due to the volume of applications, we receive, we regret that only those selected to interview will be contacted.