About the role
Job Details
- Role: Senior Facial Character TD (CONTRACT)
- Location: United States, Remote
- Employment Type: Temporary engagement through staffing partner, Yoh Enterprise Solutions.
Role Overview
The Senior Facial Character TD is responsible for authoring effective FACS shapes from scratch for human and non-human characters, collaborating on high-fidelity facial animation rigs, and participating in facial research and development efforts. The role requires an expert understanding of FACS, facial anatomy, and cutting-edge facial technology.
Essential Duties and Responsibilities
- Expert level understanding of FACS and facial anatomy for cutting edge application to facial animation technology.
- Expert proficiency in sculpting FACS shapes using deformers and/or sculpting tools for human and non-human characters.
- Expert understanding of facial skeletal and muscle anatomy.
- Collaborate with animation, character art, and engineering teams to produce high quality face rigs.
- Author rigging systems to augment or support blendshape-based facial rigs.
- Author high quality photorealistic facial rigs based on FACS using blendshapes.
- Collaborate with Character Art, Animation, and Engineering teams to deliver the highest quality assets with animator/mocap friendly interfaces that run smoothly in engine.
- Contribute to automated tools and workflows for runtime optimization.
- Contribute to tools for ingesting 3rd party facial rigs.
- Process and clean 3D or 4D scan data from FACS sessions.
- Maintain knowledge of state-of-the-art approaches to facial rigging for photorealistic characters in film and games.
- Apply strong understanding of facial shape transfer techniques and implement shape transfer pipelines.
- Contribute to tools for authoring and editing facial rigs (Python/PyQt/PySide).
- May be asked to direct actors through FACS during facial acquisitions.
- May ingest and integrate facial assets from 3rd parties.
- May be expected to maintain relationships and provide feedback to external vendors.
- Perform other duties as assigned.
Supervisory Responsibilities
- No direct supervisory duties.
- Mentoring other TDs regarding facial mechanics, rigging, sculpting, or solving techniques.
Qualifications and Skills
- Technical Skills:
- Expert-level experience with Maya.
- Experience sculpting details with ZBrush, Mudbox, or comparable tools.
- Experience processing scan data with Wrap 3D/4D or comparable.
- Experience with deformation transfer workflows.
- Preferred: Experience working with faces for real-time applications (Unity, Unreal, or other).
- Proficient in Python, PyQt, and PySide for tools development.
- Other Skills:
- Strong understanding of state-of-the-art approaches to authoring photorealistic faces for film or games.
- Strong understanding of FACS, facial anatomy, and ability to identify primary action units on sight.
- General understanding of current approaches to facial performance capture and solving.
- Knowledge of modern scanning techniques including 4D scanning.
- Passion for achieving highest quality detail through iteration and refinement.
- Ability to think outside the box to achieve realistic solutions or optimize runtime performance.
- Passion for collaborating and sharing knowledge across teams.
Compensation and Benefits
- Base Pay: $80 - $80 USD per hour.
- Factors: Individual base pay range may vary based on job-related factors including knowledge, skills, experience, and location.
- Benefits: Eligible for medical, dental, and vision offerings.
Background Checks
Sony Interactive Entertainment conducts background checks at the offer stage for all new employees, which may include criminal background checks.