Technical Animator

Aston Carter•Seattle, WA

2d•$45 - $46•Onsite

About The Position

Join a team focused on developing next-generation animated avatars for employee training and accessibility initiatives. We are seeking a skilled Technical Animator with expertise in Unreal Engine, MetaHuman workflows, Control Rig development, and motion-capture integration to enhance our ASL signing avatar system. Your role will be pivotal in creating realistic and expressive animations that ensure precision and natural character motion.

Requirements

4+ years of experience in Technical Animation, Character Animation, Game Development, Virtual Production, or Interactive Media.
Advanced proficiency in Unreal Engine animation systems, including Animation Blueprints, Control Rig, Blend Spaces, Montages, and Sequencer.
Experience building and maintaining character rigs for MetaHuman or Unreal Engine skeletons.
Hands-on experience importing, retargeting, cleaning, and integrating motion-capture data.
Strong understanding of character rigging, skinning, deformation, body mechanics, and animation principles.
Proficiency in Maya, Blender, or comparable 3D animation software.
Ability to rapidly prototype, iterate, and respond to technical and creative feedback.

Nice To Haves

Experience with gesture-based communication.
Experience creating Control Rigs specifically for hand articulation, finger posing, and detailed gesture animation.
Knowledge of facial performance capture, FACS-based animation systems, and facial rig customization.
Experience with MetaHuman pipelines, including facial animation, retargeting, LOD management, and rig customization.
Experience with virtual humans, digital avatars, or real-time character animation.
Familiarity with Perforce or similar version control systems.
AAA games, cinematics, VFX, or virtual production environments.

Responsibilities

Import, retarget, clean, and optimize motion-capture data for real-time playback in Unreal Engine.
Design, build, and maintain animation rigs and Control Rigs for MetaHuman and Unreal-based characters.
Create and refine highly detailed hand and finger animations supporting accurate sign language communication and natural character performance.
Develop facial animation assets, including expressions, eye gaze behaviors, and idle states.
Implement and maintain Animation Blueprints, Blend Spaces, Montages, State Machines, and animation layers within Unreal Engine.
Prototype and iterate on signing gestures, transitions, conversational behaviors, and avatar interactions.
Collaborate with engineers, designers, and accessibility specialists to ensure animation quality and technical performance.
Produce demos and visual assets for stakeholder reviews and deployment readiness.
Establish animation standards, documentation, naming conventions, and pipeline best practices.