Overview

POSITION PURPOSE

The Senior Crowd TD is responsible for the creation and support of high quality crowd performances for film and high-end television. They act as the liaison between asset and shot departments for crowd work and act as an ambassador for technical and creative requirements.

In addition, the Senior Crowd TD will take the initiative to identify gaps or critical issues before they arise and help us develop tools and technical solutions to increase creative ability. When not assigned to a particular show, they will actively improve crowd related workflows or support any other department at the periphery. They will maintain a positive attitude in times of high stress and will maintain the motivation levels.

DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES

● Creating small and large scale crowds for feature film / animation utilizing a variety of commercial and proprietary tools, utilizing a variety of techniques (crowd simulation, crowd layout, particle instancing etc), ideally using SideFx Houdini / Maya Atoms Crowd but experience using any other commercial or proprietary crowd solution is beneficial.
● Taking ownership of the complete crowd lifecycle (from layout/previz to rendering/comp) including integration into specific dept. workflows (fx, cfx etc), briefing and advising all source depts. on crowd requirements.
● Assist artists with any technical assistance they may require including, but not limited to, troubleshooting and debugging any day-to-day production shot issues that may arise around crowd work
● Collaborating with the Dev and Digital Workflow supervision for the purpose of the continued integration of crowds into the production pipeline.
● Proactively prototyping and testing shot pipelines and demonstrating crowd FX to build confidence with creative leadership.
● Coach/train Layout,Animation or FX team-members on existing and new crowd setup tools
● Bidding crowd shot- as well as associated setup and asset work.
● Setting up crowd effects using the most appropriate techniques as per show requirements, running key shots as well as leading artists in fulfilling shot direction. Qc-ing the technical and creative quality of incoming and outgoing assets.
● Working with all required parties to solve any technical and creative crowd related challenges to their best ability.

EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE

● 4+ years’ of experience developing crowd setups in VFX feature films, highend-tv or animation
● A degree or equivalent in Computer Graphics, Computer Science or other related course

SKILLS AND ABILITIES

Technical skills
● Expert level Generalist knowledge of Maya
● Working knowledge of Houdini is a big plus
● Experience using Atoms Crowd is a big plus
● Expert level in scripting with Python, Vex…
● Strong understanding of crowd workflows
● Ability to animate character/non-character assets is a plus

Core skills
● Ability to troubleshoot and deal with competing priorities and projects
● Excellent problem solver who can focus on details while maintaining a view of the whole picture
● Ability to adapt quickly to new technologies and applications in the context of a custom feature film production pipeline
● Ability to teach new techniques and promote new approaches to push performance to the next level
● Excellent time management and communication skills