Lead Environment Concept Artist - Naughty Dog (Santa Monica, CA)
About the job
Why Naughty Dog?
For nearly 40 years, Naughty Dog has been crafting best-selling, critically acclaimed games that constantly push the boundaries of narrative, gameplay, and technology. We’ve been busy at the Kennel, most recently releasing The Last of Us Part I, a complete and faithful remake of the original game, rebuilt from the ground up and fully optimized for the PlayStation 5 and currently in development for PC. As a part of the Naughty Dog legacy, you’ll be continuing the development of extraordinary and enduring experiences for a broad, global range of audiences.
Naughty Dog games have long been lauded for their evocative, character-driven stories and attention to detail. We are committed to innovation within our games and as such have curated some of the top creative and technically innovative minds in the industry. We welcome a diverse group of candidates and believe that a broad range of cultural and life experiences contribute to the overall well-being and success of the studio and the titles we craft together.
Naughty Dog is looking for an experienced Environment Concept Artist to join our team in creating the next generation of award-winning story telling! You’ll be responsible for creating the captivating environments and props working alongside the Background and Layout Design teams to bring these environments to life.
Salary:
The estimated base pay range for this role is listed below.
$128,400—$192,600 USD
Who We’re Looking For
Communicates with Directors to bring directions to the environment concept team
Manages and supports the environment concept team to make sure they get properly tasked and balances their workload, ensuring environment concept team’s wellbeing
Manages individual concept artists, to keep their work on schedule
Builds and modifies schedule, based on the team and studio needs
Maintains a clear and consistent workflow under an established schedule
Works closely with Leads, Principals and Directors to keep quality and style consistent across all environments
Gives feedback to principals, seniors, and concept artists, to ensure environments are high quality and consistent
Provides direction to concept artists for aesthetic and technical considerations and help set the quality bar for environments
Understands other department workflows and dependencies related to the environment concept team.
Monitors the needs for Layout Design, Lighting, Background Art and Foreground Art to ensure clear environments in game
Works closely with Background Art and Lighting to create environments that meet artistic requirements
Works with principals to improve or solve workflow or pipeline issues and overall create strategies to achieve department goals.
Had extensive knowledge of the latest game development tools, techniques, and workflows (including internal proprietary tools) and ability to share this with the team
As an individual contributor, be able to make environment concepts in the highest quality across the industry
What Skills You Will Use
Great capacity of managing the environment concept team in terms of art and building achievable, realistic schedules, according to the needs of the studio
Develop and maintain strong creative and collaborative partnerships across disciplines to help further develop the game environment and visual language
Actively improve your skills and maintain an awareness of industry techniques, tools, evaluate competitive products, learning new software packages and traditional art methods
At least 8 years of experience as a concept artist, working on at least one AAA title
Great capacity to give the team feedback and help set the quality bar
Very strong portfolio showing high quality concepts
Expertise in concepting environments, high vision concept art, hard-surface props, key-frames and production callouts for games
Keen eye and strong foundational art skills to include form, lighting, colors, and composition
Knowledge of working with various 3D packages, used in concept work and in collaboration with other departments
Sony is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All persons will receive consideration for employment without regard to gender (including gender identity, gender expression, and gender reassignment), race (including color, nationality, ethnic, national origin), religion or belief, marital or civil partnership status, disability, age, sexual orientation, pregnancy or parental status, trade union membership or membership in any other legally protected category.
We strive to create an inclusive environment, empower employees, and embrace diversity. We encourage everyone to respond.
At SIE, we consider several factors when setting each role’s base pay range, including the competitive benchmarking data for the market and geographic location. Please note that the base pay range may vary in line with our hybrid working policy and individual base pay will be determined based on job-related factors which may include knowledge, skills, experience, and location.
In addition, this role may be eligible for bonus and SIE’s top-tier benefits package that includes medical, dental, vision, matching 401(k), paid time off, wellness program and coveted employee discounts for Sony products.
Please note depending on employment type these benefits may vary.
