Character Artist

Who We Are

Founded in 2023, Small Axe Studios is 2K’s newest stand-alone studio, built to push the boundaries of game development and bring 2K’s next groundbreaking sports franchise to life. Headquartered in Burnaby, we are assembling a world-class team of visionaries, builders, and passionate gamers who thrive on creative collaboration, technical excellence, and bold ideas. At Small Axe Studios, we believe big things start with sharp focus—and we’re crafting an exceptional, player-first experience from the ground up. If you’re ready to tackle unique challenges, leave your mark on a brand-new IP, and help shape the future of interactive sports entertainment, we want you on our team!

What We Need

As a Senior Professional Character Artist at 2K Sports Lab, you will have a key role collaborating closely with our Art Director and Lead Character Artist to help bring our visions to life and forge authentic and believable characters that the players can enjoy for many years to come. You enjoy being responsible for crafting the highest quality, industry leading, characters that will make an everlasting impact for the game.

What You’ll Do

• Collaborate with leadership to establish visual targets and push boundaries on quality of character assets.
• Work closely with other departments (animators, artists, and technical artists) to ensure art assets are working well and build an excellent player experience.
• Build high quality digital sculpts, textures and groom hair.
• Work in Unreal Engine 5, while actively following development of character creation and pipelines in the industry while balancing performance.
• Assemble character assets to be used in the game engine.
• Create Industry-Leading Grooms: Procedurally groom realistic hair using industry-standard tools (XGen, Ornatrix), as well as author highly optimized hair cards for real-time rendering.

What Will Make You a Great Fit

• 5+ years of experience in the games, film, or animation industry.
• Previous experience shipping at least 1 AAA title.
• Ability to build believable groom hair using dedicated tools (XGen, Ornatrix).
• Knowledge of Maya, Unreal Engine, Substance Painter/Designer, PBR Workflow, zBrush, Marvelous Designer and Photoshop.
• Experience working with 3d scanned assets.
• Aesthetic ability to improve details with minimal concept and art direction.
• Have a proven understanding of human anatomy and clothing construction.
• Have a good understanding working with blendshapes and facial animation.
• Self-starter and independent, able to take feedback and run with it.
• Follow and collaborate with concept artists.