Technical Animator

About Star Stable Entertainment

Star Stable Entertainment was founded in 2011, sparked by a desire for a game that could make a difference. Although half of gamers are girls and women, they were under-represented in the gaming industry, both as characters and creators. We dreamed of an epic online world where tween and teen girls could share an amazing experience. And we wanted to challenge how things were done in a male-dominated industry.

The result was Star Stable Online, which has gone on to become the world’s number one horse game with over 21 million registered users across 180 countries. We’re thrilled to welcome fun-loving players to the island of Jorvik, with its breathtaking scenery, beautiful horses, and magical quests. And we’re proud to see each player's special bond with their four-legged friends and the passionate community of Star Stable players.

As of 2022, our company has 200+ employees with a female to male ratio of 54/46, unheard of in the gaming industry. Our world has expanded into the Star Stable Universe and includes books, music, animated series, and mobile apps. And we continue to champion diverse characters and narratives, encouraging our audience to be their true selves. It’s wonderful to see our dream resonate with so many players around the world, and we can’t wait to share more stories and experiences with them!

The Position

We are now looking for a Technical Animator. As a Tech animator at Star Stable, you will be the bridge between code and art, ensuring that art content and features are optimised and well-integrated into the game. You will be working closely with the art director, artists, and programmers working with both the tools and the engine. Your main responsibility will be to facilitate animators, improve efficiency level, character setups and rigging of animals, characters and other in games objects.

To thrive in this position, we think you

- Experience with Unity Engine strongly preferred.

- Have a minimum of 4 years of experience in scripting and coding for developing tools.

- Are proficient in working with Maya, focusing on skinning and rigging.

- Have a good understanding of the animation principles within games and are comfortable with applying them in projects.

- Have experience with game animation pipelines and game engines.

- Are a self-motivated individual capable of planning, prioritising, and executing your tasks according to the team's needs.

- Good communication skills with the ability to clearly deliver information effectively to both technical and non-technical groups

- Experience with our game editor and engine with bonus for having experience with other game engines and tools

- Ability to create technical documentation

- Knowledge and interest in tech-animation areas (ie: scripting, rigging, animation, physics simulations)

- Expert knowledge of Maya, rigging in Maya and Python for Maya

- Working knowledge of Python, MEL, PyQt / PySide, with C++ experience being a big bonus.

- Willingness to listen to and implement feedback from various members of the organisation.

Responsibilities:

- Perform technical animation tasks and assist in hand keyed animations.

- Responsible for Character Animation systems Character pipelines.

- Rigging & Animator Tools.

- Game Effect Animations Animation import and export. Designing, producing and assisting in implementing assets for Star Stable Entertainment

- Working with secondary animation systems in the editor / engine

- Working with the animation team to define, create and maintain the animation pipeline

- Creating tools and scripts to increase productivity and efficiency of art teams across both animation and asset creation

- Supports and improves the integration of animation assets from Maya to game engine

- Creating documentation and guidelines for tools and animation pipeline.

- Being a bridge between animation and code

- Together with the Art director being proactive in developing our game/other games style guides with new animations, technology and principals

- Creating scripts to make exporting, and the overall workflow, easier for the animators

- Optimizing and building tools for SSO's game editor

- Rigging horses and characters

Interested? This is what we can offer you:

- Flexible working opportunities.

- We’re more than 50% female-identifying! #YES to #WomenInTech!

- We’re known to throw good parties from time to time.

- We may be a big group, but we’re a tight-knit team! A diverse team of friendly, fun, and supportive co-workers from 20 different countries!

- 30 Vacation Days.

- ITP1 Insurance plan.

- Parental pay top up to 90%

Apply!

At Star Stable Entertainment, you will be a part of diverse culture with a no-crunch policy, a prioritised work-life balance, and a workforce eager to test and try new things! We are on an adventure to scale our unique impact in the world with new franchises across desktop/mobile, a long-form animation, and a licensing program all currently in development.

If you are excited about making a difference and being part of an exciting journey then we would love to hear from you!