Outsourcing Technical Artist | North America | Canada | Europe | Fully Remote

What we are looking for:

Escape Velocity is looking for an Outsourcing Technical Artist, who is focused on Materials development and responsible for developing, maintaining, and optimizing real-time materials within Unreal Engine. This role will support the art and engineering teams by building scalable shader systems, ensuring high visual fidelity while maintaining performance across multiple platforms.

What we will do together:

• Work with art and engineering to understand visual requirements and performance constraints.
• Develop, optimize, and maintain advanced materials and shaders using Unreal Engine
• Create reusable material functions and dynamic systems to support a wide range of surface types (environment, characters, VFX).
• Research and prototype new shading techniques to push visual quality and efficiency.
• Collaborate with rendering engineers to identify and resolve performance bottlenecks related to materials.
• Help define and maintain material pipelines and documentation for the art team.

What you will bring:

Our ideal Material Technical Artist has both an artistic and technical background in real-time rendering and material creation. We need someone who understands how surfaces respond to light and can convert artistic goals into efficient, scalable shader solutions. You are a collaborative problem-solver who thrives at the intersection of art and technology.

• 3+ years of experience in a Technical Art or Material/Shader Art role.
• At least one released title on the current or previous console generation (gen8, gen9), preferably AAA.
• Strong knowledge of Unreal Engine’s material system (Material Editor, Material Functions, Material Instances).
• Deep understanding of PBR workflows, surface response, and lighting fundamentals.
• Experience creating and optimizing complex shaders for real-time performance.
• Proficiency with Substance Designer/Painter, Photoshop, or similar texturing tools.
• Familiarity with scripting or shader languages (HLSL, GLSL, Python) a plus.
• Ability to balance visual quality and technical constraints.
• Strong communication skills and ability to collaborate with multiple disciplines.
• Excellent time management and creative problem-solving skills.
• Ability to work independently with a high level of autonomy.

Interested… a bit about Escape Velocity:

Escape Velocity is a team of passionate, talented developers working at a studio that offers excellent benefits, on what we believe is a once-in-a-career project with a committed publisher. But that doesn’t necessarily make us unique. What does make us special? We value the time, energy, and talent of our players and our colleagues. We want every hour spent developing and playing our games to be an incredibly rewarding and worthwhile use of your time. To that end, we are ‘Fully Remote’ and support team members nearly anywhere in the world. We prioritize honesty, even when that means sharing bad news. We strive to give everyone autonomy so they can determine how best to work and play, and we care more about what you bring to the game and studio than how many hours you’re clocking. We’re dedicated to building a culture of play, which not only makes us better game makers, but also strengthens the bonds between us all. We believe in constant improvement across all areas – from the game itself to our production design – and are constantly re-evaluating how we spend our time to ensure that we’re not wasting yours and we’re all always working on the most important things.

A few benefits you can expect from us:

• A generous PTO allowance
• Summer and Winter holidays studio closure (separate to PTO allowance)
• Private Medical & Dental Healthcare
• Private Mental Health scheme
• A generous annual Health & Wellbeing allowance
• Discretionary Studio Bonus
• Top range tech for your home set up
• Other benefits based on your region

How to apply:

Click apply and complete an application along with a Resume / CV. If we would like to move forward with your application, a member of the Recruiting Team will reach out to you and guide you through our process.

Escape Velocity is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to hiring, promoting, and compensating employees based on their qualifications and demonstrated ability to perform job responsibilities.

Applications will be considered regardless of age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, belief, race, or any other protected category.