Lead Technical Artist

JR United Kingdom; London; Remote; GBP 50,000 - 80,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading game studio is seeking a proactive Lead Technical Artist to bridge the gap between art and engineering. This role involves guiding the technical art direction of projects while mentoring a team. Candidates should have a strong experience in game development, particularly with Unreal Engine 5, as well as a passion for creativity and optimization within games. Join a remote-first team dedicated to creating innovative gaming experiences!

Qualifications

• 5+ years in game development with 2 shipped titles.
• Experience in leadership or mentorship roles.
• Solid understanding of shaders and procedural content generation.

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain scalable art pipelines and tools.
• Oversee shader development, optimization, and documentation.
• Mentor Technical Artists to develop their skills.

Skills

Leadership

Unreal Engine 5

Shader programming

Python

Collaboration

Problem-solving

Tools

Maya

Blender

Houdini

Substance

Job description

Social network you want to login/join with:

We are looking for a proactive and creative Lead Technical Artist to join our growing remote team. You will be responsible for bridging the gap between art and engineering, guiding the technical art direction of the project while mentoring a team of Technical Artists. As we scale our game development capabilities, we need someone with a sharp eye for performance, a passion for optimization, and a desire to push creative boundaries through tech.

You will report directly to the Art Director, working closely with design, engineering, and art to ensure our tools, pipelines, and assets are efficient, scalable, and aligned with the visual goals of the game. If you're excited by the idea of leading a small but ambitious team while getting your hands dirty solving complex technical challenges, then this role is for you.

Your Role

Tech Art & Pipeline Development:

• Develop and maintain scalable art pipelines and tools to support artists and designers.
• Collaborate with engineering to integrate art assets efficiently into the game engine.
• Lead technical problem-solving and support debugging of art-related performance issues (e.g., draw calls, LODs, shaders, memory usage)
• Oversee shader development, optimization, and documentation.
• Maintain a high-quality visual bar while meeting memory and performance budgets.
• Build and maintain procedural content generation pipelines.
• Mentor Technical Artists to develop their skills and workflows.
• Review work, provide clear feedback, and foster a growth-oriented team culture.
• Support resource planning and contribute to project milestone pacing.
• Coordinate with department leads to align priorities across disciplines.

We’re Ideally Looking For:

Must-Haves:

• 5+ years of experience in game development, with at least 2 shipped titles.
• Previous experience in a leadership or mentorship role.
• Strong proficiency in Unreal Engine 5 (Blueprints, Material Editor, and optimization tools).
• Experience developing and maintaining art pipelines and custom tools (Python, C++, etc.).
• Solid understanding of shaders, modeling, rendering, lighting, VFX, rigging, skinning, animation and procedural content generation systems.
• Familiarity with automation for asset creation and integration.
• Shader programming (HLSL, GLSL, Unreal Material Editor).
• Python, MEL, or MaxScript for tool development.
• DCC software (Maya, Blender, Houdini, Substance, etc.).
• Unreal Engine and pipeline knowledge.

Nice-to-Haves:

• Experience as a Technical Designer (gameplay systems design, scripting (Blueprints, Lua, C#), prototyping new mechanics or systemic features, creating tools and debugging for designers.
• Console development experience and cross-platform optimization.
• Passion for stylized or modular workflows.

Example Tasks:

• Building a shader that supports stylized outlines.
• Writing a Python script to auto-name and export assets from Blender.
• Creating a Houdini tool to auto-generate rocks with LODs.

About Couch Heroes:

Couch Heroes is a growing, international game studio dedicated to creating a social gaming platform that celebrates creativity, expression, and meaningful player connection. We’re building something new: a modular, social-first game world that lets players shape stories, discover content, and collaborate across experiences.

We're a remote-first team with legal entities in the UK and we’re currently scaling operations to support an ambitious multi-year roadmap. Our team blends deep AAA experience with fresh perspectives, and we value autonomy, curiosity, and cross-functional collaboration.