Associate Art Director - Characters

About the role

NBCUniversal is looking for an experienced Associate Art Director - Characters to lead, define and drive the visual direction and consistency of characters for a new interactive entertainment experience. The role ensures that the full character ecosystem, including hero characters and large-scale population systems, achieves a high level of quality, cohesion and scalability. It reports to the Art Director and works closely with Character Art Leads, Technical Art and cross-disciplinary teams.

Key responsibilities

• Define and communicate the visual direction for characters across the full project.
• Ensure consistency and quality across the character ecosystem, including hero characters and crowd systems.
• Lead and manage Character Art Leads and Review Artists, providing mentoring, direction, feedback and alignment.
• Review assets and validate quality against artistic and technical standards.
• Drive collaboration with Animation, Design, Tech Art and Lighting teams.
• Keep art direction aligned with production constraints and scalable pipelines, and maintain visual consistency with internal teams and external partners.
• Identify risks and guide teams to deliver quality at scale in large production environments.

Required profile

• Extensive experience (10+ years) in AAA game development focused on character art.
• Proven experience leading multiple teams or disciplines on a published AAA title.
• Strong portfolio showing high-quality character work and artistic direction.
• Experience with large-scale modular character systems such as crowds or customization pipelines.
• Willingness to work in the Montreal office at least 4 days a week, legal authorization to work in Canada, and willingness to travel for work-related business.

Required skills

• Strong understanding of modular character pipelines and real-time production workflows.
• Solid grasp of technical constraints allowing scalability across platforms, from high-end to mobile.
• Ability to translate artistic vision into clear direction for teams.
• Leadership, communication and collaboration skills.
• Unreal Engine 5 and Metahuman experience is a plus.