Who We Are

Gardens is a new remote games studio from developers of games like Journey, What Remains of Edith Finch, Blaseball, Spider-Man, Dustforce, Skyrim, Ashen, and more. We’re named after the games we grow together — lush, living worlds that bring players together to cultivate lasting friendships. Worlds that offer surprising multiplayer experiences and flourish with the help of their communities.

We believe a team of diverse voices has the most to say, and we are committed to providing a healthy, inclusive, collaborative, and transparent work environment for all!

We offer competitive pay, stock options, unlimited PTO, 35 hour work weeks, and robust benefits (including full medical and vision, dental, 401k contributions and more)!

We are currently creating our flagship project — a shared 3D fantasy adventure inspired by our favorite memories playing online games over the years.

It’s the world we want to play in every day!

Who We're Looking For

We are seeking a full-time Technical Animator for our flagship and future games at our growing remote studio!

Gardens will be creating a large amount of highly stylized art and in-game assets. We're looking for a Technical Animator that can act as both a creative contributor and technical bridge between artists and programmers to create lush, seamless interactions between characters and the world around them.

This role requires a solid understanding of cutting-edge tools and pipelines for character art and animation for next-gen game development. This position will work with creative and technical leads, as well as artists and animators, to create and constantly improve upon our pipelines.

The Technical Animator will be responsible for importing keyframed animations, creating the necessary information for IK events and constraints to ground our animations within the world.

We seek collaborative individuals that are excited to contribute innovative and original ideas across all aspects of our game's production & design, working together as a team.

Responsibilities

• Develop IK rigging tools, scripts, and plugins to help support our interactive gameplay.
• Provide and create solutions to enable runtime advanced deformation on characters, creatures, and other assets that are animated/simulated.
• Provide technical support for a variety of disciplines focusing on rigged content.
• Co-develop tools that support and empower our artists and designers
• Help to build, customize, streamline and maintain our art pipeline
• Proactively seek out pipeline improvements, workflows and technology issues.
• Think creatively to resolve technical challenges and limitations
• Collaborate and communicate daily with teammates creating content.

Qualifications

• In-engine animation layering knowledge
• Experience with Unity3D
• 3+ years of experience
• Good insight of standard industry tools like Motion Builder, 3DS Max, Maya
• Fair grasp of modeling, rigging, animating, scripting
• Experience in workflows, software, and techniques related to the creation of clothing, fur, and hair.
• Ample scripting experience
• Excellent organizational skills
• Built import/export pipelines for artists on at least one (preferably shipped) game
• Ability and drive to contribute innovative and original ideas across all aspects of the game's design & production.
• Located in PT, MT, CT, ET time zone, or willing to relocate

Bonus Qualifications:

• Experience with Houdini and other procedural generation tools
• VFX capabilities
• Demonstrate technical proficiency in areas such as lighting and rendering, texturing, materials and graphics-related programming languages such as shaders

Gardens Offers*

• Competitive pay
• Stock Options
• Medical, dental, and vision coverage
• 401k Contributions
• 35 Hour Work Weeks
• Training and mentorship
• Unlimited paid vacation, holiday and sick time with flexibility in timing

• Flexibility in work location(s) -- Gardens will open a physical studio location in the future. Employees will have the choice to continue working remotely, or to relocate and work on site.

* Benefits and perks listed may vary depending on the nature of your employment with Gardens and the country in which you work.

To Apply

Send your application to careers@gardens.dev with the title "Technical Animator".

Please include links to your portfolio on the first line of your email, including any past projects you have worked on. Stylized is preferred!

All persons will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, pregnancy, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, age, legally protected physical or mental disability, covered veteran status, status in the U.S. uniformed services, sexual orientation, marital status, genetic information or membership in any other legally protected category.

We strive to create an inclusive environment, empower employees and embrace diversity. We encourage everyone to respond.

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