Senior Cinematic Animator

Warner Bros Games; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 60,000 - GBP 80,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading gaming company in Greater London is seeking a Cinematic Animator to bring life to their game narratives through advanced animation techniques and storytelling. You will collaborate with various departments to ensure high-quality cinematic scenes while leveraging your expertise in Unreal Engine and traditional animation principles. A minimum of one AAA title experience is essential, along with strong communication and organizational skills. This position offers a hybrid work model allowing both remote and in-office work.

Benefits

Career defining opportunities

Curated benefits

Supportive work environment

Qualifications

• Experience working and shipping at least one AAA video game title.
• Excellent communication and organizational skills.
• Strong animation foundations for body mechanics, facial animation, camera, and timing.

Responsibilities

• Create and develop industry leading cinematic scenes that support the narrative.
• Work with motion capture data, keyframe animation, and in-engine manipulation.
• Set up and develop cinematic scenes from pre-visualization to final quality.

Skills

Animation foundations

Communication skills

Understanding of game engines

Cinematic storytelling

3D animation software proficiency

Motion capture production support

Education

Experience shipping an AAA video game title

Tools

Unreal Engine

Maya

Motion Builder

Job description

Overview

Welcome to Warner Bros. Discovery… the stuff dreams are made of.

Who We Are…

When we say, “the stuff dreams are made of,” we’re not just referring to the world of wizards, dragons and superheroes, or even to the wonders of Planet Earth. Behind WBD’s vast portfolio of iconic content and beloved brands, are the storytellers bringing our characters to life, the creators bringing them to your living rooms and the dreamers creating what’s next…

From brilliant creatives, to technology trailblazers, across the globe, WBD offers career defining opportunities, thoughtfully curated benefits, and the tools to explore and grow into your best selves. Here you are supported, here you are celebrated, here you can thrive.

Your New Role

In this role, you will join the Cinematic Team responsible for bringing life, mood, and tone to our real-time in-engine cinematics through high-quality character animation, composition, camera work, and editing. You will bring our project’s visual voice to life through narrative sequences. Your primary objective will be to create and implement cinematics from the mocap stage to in-engine playback.

You will also be involved in defining best practices, processes, and pipelines to improve workflow while establishing a high standard of visual excellence to create high-quality content and immersive storytelling. You will collaborate across different disciplines, including design, narrative, character, art, technical animation, and programming, to advance the vision coherently while respecting technical constraints and budgets.

Your Role Accountabilities

• Create and develop industry leading cinematic scenes that support the narrative of the game. (e.g., Cinematography, Composition, Layout, and Editing)
• Be versatile working with motion capture data, keyframe animation, and in-engine manipulation of animation content. (e.g., Performance Capture, Prop and Camera data)
• Set up and develop cinematic scenes and animations from pre-visualization to final quality in the game engine (Unreal).
• Responsible for animating characters and bringing life to our games with memorable storytelling under WB branded IPs.
• Deliver tasks on time, on schedule and reviewing content in engine.
• Work closely with the Cinematic Director to ensure scene content and direction is consistent and reaches the desired quality goals.
• Problem solve and collaborate with all neighbouring departments focused on cinematics to ensure the work being output is always relevant and current.

Qualifications & Experience

• Experience working and shipping at least one AAA video game title.
• Excellent communication and organizational skills.
• Excellent understanding of in-game engines; knowledge of Unreal 5 is highly desired. (i.e., Sequencer and Metahuman)
• Strong animation foundations for body mechanics, facial animation, camera, and timing.
• Keen eye for cinematic storytelling with camera language, composition and editing.
• Proficient with 3D animation software (Maya, Motion Builder, etc.).
• Proficient with the motion capture production process and able to support the pipeline.
• Positive attitude and strong understanding of the game development process and understanding of art/animation pipelines on PC and consoles.
• Portfolio/Demo Reel/Website demonstrating your animation skills is required.

Hybrid Working - This role is advertised as a Hybrid work model, that combines remote and in-office work, following our current company policy and to be agreed with your Line Manager. Subject to any applicable laws, WBD / your Line Manager reserves the right to change this working agreement where this is essential to business needs and upon reasonable notice to you.

How We Get Things Done

This last bit is probably the most important! Here at WBD, our guiding principles are the core values by which we operate and are central to how we get things done. You can find them at www.wbd.com/guiding-principles/ along with some insights from the team on what they mean and how they show up in their day to day. We hope they resonate with you and look forward to discussing them during your interview.

Championing Inclusion at WBD

Warner Bros. Discovery embraces the opportunity to build a workforce that reflects a wide array of perspectives, backgrounds and experiences. Being an equal opportunity employer means that we take seriously our responsibility to consider qualified candidates on the basis of merit, regardless of sex, gender identity, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, religion or belief, marital status, pregnancy, parenthood, disability or any other category protected by law.

If you’re a qualified candidate with a disability and you require adjustments or accommodations during the job application and/or recruitment process, please visit our accessibility page for instructions to submit your request.