Job Summary:
The Asset/Show Technical Director (TD) is responsible for supporting, developing, and optimizing shot/asset workflows for One of Us. This role involves troubleshooting shot/asset related technical challenges, ensuring smooth integration across departments, and working closely with artists, hods, developers, and production teams to maintain efficiency in Asset/Show creation and management. The TD will work within the pipeline to enable seamless delivery while maintaining high-quality standards.
Key Responsibilities:
- Develop, maintain, and support asset and show-specific technical workflows, ensuring efficient integration with the studio pipeline.
- Work closely with relevant departments to optimize asset usability across the pipeline.
- Troubleshoot technical issues related to asset ingestion, publishing, referencing, and rendering.
- Automate repetitive processes to improve efficiency and reduce artist workload.
- Collaborate with the pipeline team to enhance asset management systems, ensuring version control, dependency tracking, and storage efficiency.
- Work with supervisors and leads to define technical asset requirements.
- Assist with USD and MaterialX implementations for asset authoring and rendering.
- Ensure assets meet technical specifications for rendering engines such as Arnold and Karma.
- Provide artist support and training on tools and workflows to ensure best practices are followed.
- Maintain clear documentation for tools, workflows, and best practices.
Required Skills & Experience:
- 3+ years of experience in a Technical Director or Pipeline-related role within VFX or animation.
- Strong proficiency in Python and experience with pipeline scripting in a production environment.
- Experience working with DCC applications such as Maya, Houdini or Nuke.
- Experience with USD (Universal Scene Description) and its implementation in asset workflows is a plus.
- Basic understanding of shading, lookdev, and rendering processes in Arnold & Karma.
- Experience with version control systems like Git.
- Strong problem-solving skills and ability to troubleshoot asset / shot-related pipeline issues.
- Familiarity with ShotGrid (or other asset tracking software) for asset management.
- Excellent communication and collaboration skills, with the ability to work effectively with artists and developers.
- Experience working in a Linux-based production environment.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Experience with C++ or advanced Python for deeper pipeline development.
- Familiarity with MaterialX and shader authoring for physically based rendering workflows.
- Experience with Houdini Solaris and procedural asset generation.
- Background in rigging or procedural modeling for asset automation.
- Knowledge of render farm management systems such as Tractor.
- Experience developing tools with PySide/PyQt for artist-friendly UI solutions.