Principal Character Artist (Face)

About the role

NBCUniversal is looking for a Principal Character Artist (Face) to define and drive facial art standards and solve complex character challenges for an ambitious interactive entertainment experience. The role ensures that facial assets achieve the highest visual quality, expressiveness and technical quality, and works closely with the Lead Character Artist (Face), Animation, Technical Art and cross-disciplinary teams. It advances pipelines, methodologies and facial systems, acting as an expert in scanning, blendshape workflows and real-time character performance.

Key responsibilities

• Define and maintain high-quality standards for facial assets across the project.
• Solve complex artistic and technical challenges related to facial realism and performance.
• Act as an expert in facial systems, including scanning, blendshape pipelines and real-time character workflows.
• Collaborate with Animation and Technical Art teams to integrate facial rigs and performance systems.
• Contribute to the design and evolution of facial pipelines, tools and best practices.
• Produce benchmarks and ensure consistency and quality across facial assets.
• Review and validate facial content against artistic and technical standards.
• Drive innovation in facial workflows to improve expressive realism, scalability and efficiency.

Required profile

• Extensive experience in AAA game development focused on modular character art.
• Strong portfolio showing expertise in high-quality facial modeling and realism.
• Advanced understanding of human facial anatomy, expressions and performance.
• Ability to solve complex artistic and technical challenges.
• Excellent communication and collaboration skills.

Required skills

• Expertise in facial systems: blendshapes, scanning and real-time pipelines.
• Understanding of modular character pipelines and production workflows.
• Desired: experience developing or improving facial pipelines at scale, performance capture workflows, Unreal Engine and Metahuman, and working with distributed teams or external partners.