3D Animator

(f/d/m)

We are looking for a full-time 3D Animator to support our content department. You will be working closely with our Creative Director as well as a team of designers, engineers and other artists here in Vienna.

The Position

For a small team like us, understanding constraints and dealing with them effectively is essential. But instead of seeking to eliminate them, we want to embrace them - and leverage them into experiences that move people.

Closely collaborating with our Creative Director, Art Director, designers and sometimes even engineers, you will develop an understanding of a project’s vision and find ways to convey it through motion.

Check out our general introduction! While not all aspects may apply to this position, it can help give you a feeling for the kind of environment you are getting into :)

Here’s what you do

Working as part of Mi’pu’mi’s content team (designers and artists), you will create animation content in 3D, using a wide variety of tools and pipelines. You seek to tie together and elevate everybody else’s work with animation.

You’ll be talking to directors and designers frequently, trying to understand their vision and ideas so you can communicate them visually. Your target audience includes colleagues, external development partners, publishers and ultimately players.

We strive to work towards deliberate and explicit goals. Supporting this effort, you will be identifying your own goals as well as efficient ways to achieve them. You provide reasonable time estimates and find ways to make the most of any given time-box. This includes knowing your limits and speaking up when you think something can’t be done.

Here’s what you need

We know that stringent requirements can be intimidating when applying for a job. We don’t want to alienate promising candidates with pretentious-sounding words - Ultimately, we’d love for you to make the role your own. However, there is a couple of tools you can bring to make that process easier:

You have internalized that critical feedback is essential in delivering a convincing product. It’s never your taste, ego or personality that is being scrutinized but the output of our joint creative efforts. Therefore, you always strive for improving your process by pro-actively asking for, receiving and acting on critical feedback. When people struggle to voice their feelings in constructive ways, you are willing to ask selfless questions and read between the lines.

Sometimes, we will find that the direction or specification wasn’t quite there yet. We need you to be able to recognize and communicate issues as they approach. You understand that in a collaborative environment, voicing concerns is never about assigning blame - It’s always about finding a way forward. Consequently, you are not easily discouraged when your or somebody else’s work needs more iteration.

Collaborating with diverse teams, you communicate clearly and precisely, both written and verbally, in English. Your understanding and empathy for other points of view is paired with the ability to make a convincing positive case for your own ideas.

You are familiar with 3D animation and the use of Maya or Blender (knowledge of tools like MotionBuilder or Spine is a plus). You bring a good sense for timing and an attention to detail, but you also know when to spend less time and go for broad strokes. Your portfolio provides plenty of examples for these skills.

Knowing that your animation needs to convey important gameplay information, you are comfortable focusing on strong poses and expressive keyframes long before curves enter the mix. You have a keen eye for timing and strive for efficiency in motion - In game development, less is more and you know it.

Although setting up animation rigs and skinning meshes to them will not be the brunt of your work, a familiarity with these workflows goes a long way towards relying less on others.

Familiarity with integrating your art into game engines or frameworks like Unreal or Unity is not strictly necessary but will help you a lot.

Keeping your work files clean and finding effective pipeline-, version control- and export settings will make it easier for teammates to interact with your work.

Being able to create your own working assets in 3D to get going is optional but a big plus.

Sharing our commitment and passion, you have a strong appreciation and interest for video games. You play and observe to know what’s out there. This helps you maintain a perspective about what others in the field can achieve using the same tools as you.

As much as this page mentions understanding and executing on other people’s ideas - It’s your very own desire to express yourself creatively that matters, and we are looking forward to embrace and develop it!