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Want to be part of a new team at EA developing high-performance and highly-available online systems supporting millions of gamers?

Electronic Arts studio located in Vancouver, BC is looking for a senior 3D Technical Artist / CG Supervisor to help develop our next generation online gaming platform.
If you love challenges in building cutting edge online graphics systems and have a passion for gaming, this is the role for you.
Come work and play alongside some of the most talented people in interactive technology as we continue to build a dynasty and grow our dominant share of the sports games industry.

The Technical Artist or CG Supervisor is expected to be the bridge between Artists and Engineers, while bringing a wealth of knowledge of asset construction techniques within next generation graphics environments. Individuals in this role are pro-active problem solvers who demonstrate a strong sense of creativity and respect for aesthetics. They are capable of designing and implementing complex, data-driven procedural asset pipelines while jointly able of authoring quality art assets within Maya and/or Houdini. Candidates can be from an Art, Design, Mathematics, Engineering or Science background; however they must demonstrate a comfort level in working with both art and technology. Working with Programming/Technical staff the Technical Artist ensures that assets are easily integrated into the graphics engine without sacrificing artistic integrity.

Candidates coming from outside the game industry will be expected to learn/understand how game-play and architecture issues can affect content creation and successfully develop workflows to compensate for such limitations on artistic content.

Responsibilities:
- Develop solutions to various 3D environment and character construction production, including efficient asset pipelines, data-driven procedural character setups and working with rendering engineers and artists
- Solve innovative goals by providing expertise of 3D characters asset construction and authoring (body, rigging, skinning, poses, animations, shaders, etc)
- Design, develop and debug large-scale asset authoring tools and asset pipelines spanning multiple projects and target platforms
- Produce and integrate art assets where necessary
- Write basic to intermediate level scripts and expressions within a CG authoring package (i.e. Mel) to improve efficiency of various artist tasks
- Be able to proactively investigate and implement technology, tools and methods appropriate to the art direction of the product (with careful consideration for optimization and product demands)
- Document technology choices and solutions

Requirements:
- At least 5 years cinematic/games production experience, with strong character construction background
- Work in production team in various stages of modeling, texturing and lighting at very proficient level
- Intermediate scripting experience with: MEL / Maya API / MaxScript or Python / C# / Houdini / Houdini Digital Assets
- Advanced to Expert aptitude level for designing and implementing CG solutions.
- Ability to think creatively to resolve technical challenges and limitations which scale well
- Proficiency with at least one 3d package (Maya / Houdini preferred) to the extent of being able to author and troubleshoot character models and rigging
-An understanding of the art language. The ability to understand and communicate art briefs, it is fundamental for the tech-artist to understand the art vision for the project.
- The ability to integrate working art assets into a developing, evolving graphical/technical pipeline

Understanding:
-Computer/game hardware(next gen, current gen and handheld), particle systems, character skeletons and rigging, image manipulation tools, shader systems, lighting.
- Knowledge of the following Real Time systems: Rendering, Dynamic Lighting, Dynamics, AI.
- Strong understanding of good asset management practices and asset construction techniques
- Proactive and forward thinking
- Ability to schedule work (self or other) with a focus on emergent SE and Art dependencies
- A willingness and confidence to provide a communication bridge between artists and SEs
- Understanding the limits of platform memory constraints with regard to visual assets.

To apply for this position, please visit EA’s job board at http://jobs.ea.com. [jobs.ea.com.] Click on the Canadian Flag and then select the Burnaby studio icon. Submit your resume online for req #19922 – Character Tech Artist/Associate CG Supervisor