Senior Animation Engineer

Hangar 13 / 2K is recruiting for the role of Senior Animation Engineer. This Senior Animation Engineer role focuses on owning core animation systems, tools and pipelines, while developing technology for believable character animation. It involves working closely with multi-disciplinary teams and setting a high bar for code quality.

Role details

• Location: Brighton & Hove

What you’ll do

• Adapt existing animation systems and build new technology within Unreal Engine 5 to meet technical and creative needs.
• Prototype and implement animation features and runtime systems, including animation graphs, state machines, blending and layering.
• Build and maintain animation tools and pipelines that help animators and technical artists work efficiently.
• Work constructively with animation, art, design and engineering teams to realise creative ambitions.
• Support planning by estimating work and checking dependencies for animation feature development.
• Identify technical and developmental risks or obstacles and help generate solutions.
• Research coding techniques and algorithms to stay current with developments in animation and the wider game industry.

What they’re looking for

• Have demonstrable programming experience in a creative environment.
• Have shipped one or more AAA game titles, ideally using Unreal Engine.
• Be highly proficient in C++, linear algebra and 3D maths, with strong familiarity with object-oriented design principles.
• Have strong experience with Unreal Engine, Blueprints and Unreal animation principles.
• Have hands-on experience with one or more animation techniques such as inverse kinematics, ragdoll physics, procedural animation, keyframe animation or forward kinematics.
• Be dedicated to code quality and documentation, and able to learn and master new technologies.
• Be able to work independently and efficiently under deadlines.
• Be an effective communicator and collaborator across multi-disciplinary teams.

Additional role information

• Experience with machine-learning-driven animation techniques is highly desirable.
• Experience with Control Rig, IK Rig and Motion Warping is highly desirable.
• Experience with newer features such as Mass locomotion, Mover or UAF/AnimNext is highly desirable.
• Hands-on development experience for Xbox Series X/S and PS5 is highly desirable.