Principal Cinematic Animator – AAA Game Studio

Hasbro; Montreal; On-site; CAD 90,000 - 125,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health & Wellness

Time Off to Recharge

Financial Well-being

Life & Family Support

Learning & Development

Exclusive Perks

Job summary

Skeleton Key, building a new studio in Montreal, is seeking a Principal Cinematic Animator to join the team and help bring our first AAA game to life. Reporting to the Animation Director, you will create high-quality cinematic sequences that integrate with gameplay, collaborating with cinematics, design, and engineering teams to deliver narrative experiences.

You will lead blending motion capture with keyframe work, optimize pipelines, and mentor junior animators.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional experience in cinematic animation for games or film.
• Strong understanding of cinematic principles, pacing, camera movement, shot selection, and character performance.
• High-level experience cleaning and polishing performance capture data.
• Excellent keyframe animation skills.
• Experience with Unreal Engine, Maya, MotionBuilder or comparable software.
• Ability to work independently and manage tasks with minimal oversight.
• Strong collaboration skills across disciplines.
• Passion for games, storytelling, and cinematic animation.

Responsibilities

• Create high-quality cinematic animation using motion capture and keyframe techniques.
• Collaborate with Cinematic Director on staging, camera work and shot composition.
• Previsualize cinematic sequences to support motion capture shoots.
• Clean up and polish motion capture performances to high fidelity.
• Refine facial animation including expressions, eyelines, and hand-keyed acting beats.
• Craft interactive cinematic moments with Design team.
• Build and maintain an animation library for systemic narrative content.
• Support implementation and debugging of cinematic animation systems and pipelines.

Skills

Cinematic animation

Mocap cleanup

Keyframe animation

Unreal Engine

Maya

MotionBuilder

Collaboration

Independent work

Storytelling

Tools

Unreal Engine

Maya

MotionBuilder

Job description

Skeleton Key, building a new studio in Montreal, is seeking a Principal Cinematic Animator to join the team and help bring our first AAA game to life. Reporting to the Animation Director, you will create high-quality cinematic sequences that integrate with gameplay, collaborating with cinematics, design, and engineering teams to deliver narrative experiences.

You will lead blending motion capture with keyframe work, optimize pipelines, and mentor junior animators.