Senior Character Artist

Role Summary

As a Senior Hair & Fur Artist, you will be responsible for creating high-quality, realistic, and optimized hair, fur, and grooming assets for AAA-quality characters. Working closely with Character Artists, Technical Artists, Rigging, Animation, and Art Directors, you will develop visually compelling hairstyles and fur systems that align with the project's artistic vision while meeting real-time performance requirements.

Responsibilities

• Create high-quality hair, fur, eyebrows, eyelashes, beards, and other groom assets for realistic and stylized characters.
• Develop production-ready hair and fur assets using industry-standard grooming tools and workflows.
• Collaborate with Character Artists, Technical Artists, Rigging, Animation, and Engineering teams to ensure seamless asset integration.
• Optimize hair and fur assets to meet quality, memory, and real-time performance targets.
• Troubleshoot and resolve technical issues related to grooming, shading, simulation, and asset implementation.
• Ensure all assets meet the project's artistic, technical, and production quality standards.
• Maintain organized documentation and follow established production pipelines and best practices.
• Contribute to workflow improvements and mentor junior artists when required.

Experience

• 5+ years of professional experience as a Hair & Fur Artist, Groom Artist, or Character Artist with a strong focus on hair grooming.
• At least one shipped AAA title or equivalent high-quality real-time project is preferred.

Mandatory Skills

• Strong portfolio demonstrating realistic and high-quality hair and fur creation.
• Expertise in XGen, Ornatrix, Houdini Groom, Blender Hair, or equivalent grooming tools.
• Strong understanding of hair cards, strand-based workflows, and real-time hair pipelines.
• Experience integrating hair and fur assets into Unreal Engine or similar game engines.
• Strong knowledge of hair shading, grooming, UVs, texturing, and optimization techniques.
• Excellent understanding of anatomy, silhouette, proportions, and artistic aesthetics.
• Ability to collaborate effectively within a cross-functional AAA production environment.

Nice to Have

• Experience with Unreal Engine Groom System.
• Knowledge of hair simulation and physics workflows.
• Experience with Marvelous Designer, ZBrush, Maya, or similar DCC tools.
• Familiarity with Python scripting or pipeline automation.
• Experience mentoring artists and improving grooming workflows.
• Passion for creating next-generation AAA characters and real-time digital humans.