Job Description

Riot’s Technical Artists focus on supporting artists with industry-leading tools, systems, and techniques to enable them to realize their work in-game. You will work with artists across all departments from modeling to lighting to ensure all assets work within the scope of the technical pipeline requirements. Working closely with each artistic department, you will standardize and improve development processes for the production of in game assets, materials, shaders, and scalable development pipelines.

The Senior Rendering Technical Artist on League of Legends is a subject matter expert that is accountable for driving progress in regards to lighting, shading, and materials used by the League Engine, in both the in-game and around-game space. You will collaborate with the rendering vision holder and art teams to set targets for this progress. You will be authoring shaders that push the boundaries of look development within League, and advocate for new rendering features on behalf of your team that would benefit from them. You will also be hands-on and directly support content and tools teams as a Shader expert.

Responsibilities:

• Author industry-defining lighting, shaders, and materials to push the quality of League’s broad catalogue of characters, VFX, and other artistic crafts
• Co-opt a future-facing plan for material and shader workflows, tools, and engine improvements to support creative goals from the Art and Product teams
• Work with art teams to evaluate current rendering technology and craft a plan to evolve existing systems
• Collaborate with tools and rendering teams on enhancements to our materials, shaders tools, and rendering workflows
• Be a bridge between Art and Engineering in the realm of materials and shaders to help both disciplines communicate effectively
• Create and consolidate documentation for using our materials and shader systems, and build discipline-wide habits to keep them up to date
• Promote performance optimization for art assets by creating clear standards and building a maintainable process for reviewing and optimizing game assets

Required Qualifications: 

• 8+ years of professional experience as a graphics or rendering technical artist in games or related industries
• Extensive experience in material development and shader writing using HLSL, CG, or other real-time shading languages
• A collaborative attitude towards bridging the gap between artistic goals and technical considerations with Art and Engineering
• A comprehensive understanding of modern lighting theory, including physically based rendering and other associated technologies and techniques used in modern consumer-grade game engines such as Unreal or Unity
• An ability to translate artistic requirements into functional and performant Materials and Shaders to be used at runtime
• Demonstrable experience authoring shaders and materials for 2D surfaces such as UI panels and motion graphics
• Experience profiling and optimizing performance of Shaders with tools such as RenderDoc or other industry standard systems

Desired Qualifications:

• A thorough understanding of 3D math used in real-time rendering
• Experience with look dev, color theory, camera lenses, and lighting direction
• Expertise in content creation and tool development in DCC tools, especially Maya, Photoshop, 3DCoat, Marmoset, Substance Designer and Painter
• Knowledge of Python to write scripts and tools
• Experience in sculpting, modeling, rigging and animation and understanding of the related workflows

For this role, you'll find success through craft expertise, a collaborative spirit, and decision-making that prioritizes the delight of players. We will be looking at your past studies, experience, and your personal relationship with games. If you embody player empathy and care about players' experiences, this could be your role!

Our Perks:

Riot focuses on work/life balance, shown by our open paid time off policy and other perks such as flexible work schedules. We offer medical, dental, and life insurance, parental leave for you, your spouse/domestic partner, and children, and a 401k with company match. Check out our benefits pages for more information.

At Riot Games, we  put players first . That mission drives every decision in our quest to create games and experiences that make it better to be a player. Whether you’re working directly on a new player-facing experience or you’re supporting the company as a whole, everyone at Riot is part of our mission. And just like in our games, we’re better when we work together. Our goal is to create collaborative teams where you are empowered to bring your unique perspective everyday. If that sounds like the kind of place you want to work, we’re looking forward to your application.

It’s our policy to provide equal employment opportunity for all applicants and members of Riot Games, Inc. Riot Games makes reasonable accommodations for handicapped and disabled Rioters and does not unlawfully discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, handicap, veteran status, marital status, criminal history, or any other category protected by applicable federal and state law. We consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with applicable federal, state and local law, including the California Fair Chance Act, the City of Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, and the Washington Fair Chance Act.

Per the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, the following core duties may create a basis for disqualifying candidates with relevant criminal histories:

• Safeguarding confidential and sensitive Company data
• Communication with others, including Rioters and third parties such as vendors, and/or players, including minors
• Accessing Company assets, secure digital systems, and networks
• Ensuring a safe interactive environment for players and other Rioters

These duties are directly related to essential operations, safety, trust, and compliance obligations within our organization. Please note that job duties may evolve based on business needs and additional responsibilities may be assigned as necessary to maintain operational efficiency and security. 

• (Los Angeles Only) Base salary range between $185,200.00 - $258,000.00 USD + incentive compensation + equity + 401K with company match + medical, dental, vision, and life insurance + short and long-term disability + open PTO.

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