We are looking for a Senior Technical Animator to join the Gameplay Animation team. In this role, you will collaborate with the Technical Animation Coordinator to take ownership of the technical side of gameplay animation inside of Unreal Engine 5. You will be driving implementation, optimization, maintenance, and debugging of animation-driven gameplay mechanics and work closely with Animators, Riggers, Programmers, Designers and other Technical Animators to ensure our animations look and feel exceptional in-game, while maintaining performance and scalability.

At CD PROJEKT RED, we animate everything in-house—with our own motion capture studio and a pipeline that empowers animators to push creative boundaries. You’ll have the opportunity to work on humanoids, animals, machines, and creatures that challenge both your artistic and technical expertise. We are especially interested in someone who has worked on large-scale projects featuring a wide variety of gameplay elements—preferably in a AAA open-world setting. If you’re an expert seeking a high-impact role empowering the gameplay animation technology of the Witcher 4, you’ve found it.

Daily responsibilities

• In-game implementation and optimization of gameplay animation features and assets in cooperation with Gameplay Animators and Designers.
• Prototyping the visual part of new gameplay mechanics in cooperation with Gameplay Animators and Designers.
• Create automation tools & validators across the entire Animation Pipeline, from the DCC applications (Maya & MotionBuilder) to the Unreal Engine editor.
• Developing and improving in-game animation systems and tools in cooperation with Animation Programmers, including creative Motion Matching applications, Procedural Animation setups, building hierarchical state machines, and physical animation configurations.
• Design, implement, and refine physics-driven animation systems with dynamic animation blending to simulate realistic and active reactions for characters.
• Ensuring cohesive visual and mechanical gameplay performance of characters across dynamically changing and diverse roles, such as player character, companion NPCs, standard NPCs and background crowd.
• Research and integrate innovative animation technologies & approaches, continuously advancing our pipeline’s and runtime system’s capabilities.
• Mentoring and training other Technical Animators, sharing best practices and fostering a culture of continuous learning and knowledge transfer.
• Participation in Motion Capture sessions in order to keep the acting performance within the gameplay requirements. 
• Establish, document and maintain animation workflow, folders, naming conventions, and engine-related structures.