Contract Advanced Animator
Austin, TX
Contracted
Experienced
Advanced Animator - 3 Month Contract
As a Contract Advanced Animator at Certain Affinity, you will operate as a high-impact contributor responsible not only for delivering exceptional animation content, but for defining, elevating, and enforcing animation standards across a large-scale live service title. You will partner closely with leadership and cross-disciplinary teams to ensure animation quality scales with the needs of a global player base, while driving consistency across both first- and third-person experiences.
This role requires deep expertise in facial animation systems, including FACS-based workflows, and a proven ability to influence pipelines, mentor senior talent, and guide visual direction at a systemic level.
Responsibilities
- Partner with the Art Leads, Design, Engineering, and Technical Animation to define and uphold animation standards, style guides, and best practices across the project
- Act as a quality bar setter, ensuring animation fidelity, consistency, and responsiveness meet the demands of a live service environment
- Create high-quality animation content, including complex gameplay, cinematic, and FACS-driven facial animation systems
- Own and evolve facial animation pipelines, ensuring scalability, reusability, and performance across a large content footprint
- Collaborate with technical teams to drive improvements in tools, runtime systems, and workflows, with a focus on efficiency and long-term maintainability
- Provide advanced mentorship and critique, elevating both senior and mid-level animators through structured feedback and hands-on guidance
- Review and guide implementation to ensure animation integrates cleanly within gameplay systems and adheres to performance constraints
- Support cross-team alignment by translating creative goals into actionable animation direction, particularly in ambiguous or evolving areas
- Contribute to feature-level animation direction, helping shape how animation supports gameplay readability, feel, and player engagement
- 6+ years of experience in game development focused on character animation
- Shipped multiple titles, including at least one live service or large-scale multiplayer game
- Demonstrated experience operating at a senior-plus level, influencing quality and workflows beyond individual asset contribution
- Strong expertise in realistic animation, including mocap cleanup, polish, and high-end keyframe work
- Deep experience with facial animation pipelines, including FACS-based systems and blendshape-driven performance
- Expert understanding of animation principles across characters, cameras, and gameplay systems
- Advanced experience with Unreal Engine (UE5 preferred) and real-time animation systems
- Proven experience developing animation for both first-person and third-person gameplay
- Strong understanding of performance constraints and optimization for console and PC
- High proficiency in Maya and familiarity with MotionBuilder or equivalent tools
- Demonstrated ability to define direction with minimal oversight and drive alignment across teams
- Extensive experience mentoring and elevating other animators, including senior peers
Extra Credit
- Experience leading or directing facial performance capture sessions, including actor direction with FACS in mind
- Strong collaboration with Technical Animation on rigging, facial systems, and runtime solutions
- Experience reviewing and coordinating work across multiple contributors or external partners
- Background in acting, anatomy, or facial performance analysis
- Familiarity with procedural animation systems, runtime blending, or live service content iteration workflows
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