3D Animator (Short Term)

Roblox; San Mateo (CA); On-site; USD 101,589 - 124,456; Full time

Job summary

Roblox is seeking a Senior 3D Animator to join our San Mateo team for a 6-month engagement. You will create foundational avatar animations—idle, walk, run, jumps—and deliver polished, game-ready motion optimized for Roblox's avatar system.

Collaborating with animation leads, designers, and engineers, you will export assets for Roblox Studio and iterate using reviews in SyncSketch. Proficiency in Maya and strong acting-through-motion skills are essential for expressive, weighty gameplay

Qualifications

• Strong experience in character animation for games (believable locomotion and actions).
• Excellent acting through motion to convey emotion, weight, timing, and personality.

Responsibilities

• Create and refine locomotion and ability animations (idle, walk, run, jump, land).
• Deliver clean, weighty animations optimized for Roblox avatar system (R15 preferred).
• Iterate quickly based on feedback from leads, designers, and engineers.
• Export animations for Roblox Studio integration with best practices.

Skills

Game animation

Character animation

Acting through motion

Animation timing

Animation principles

Tools

Autodesk Maya

SyncSketch

Job description

Every day, tens of millions of people come to Roblox to explore, create, play, learn, and connect with friends in 3D immersive digital experiences– all created by our global community of developers and creators.

At Roblox, we’re building the tools and platform that empower our community to bring any experience that they can imagine to life. Our vision is to reimagine the way people come together, from anywhere in the world, and on any device. We’re on a mission to connect a billion people with optimism and civility, and looking for amazing talent to help us get there.

A career at Roblox means you’ll be working to shape the future of human interaction, solving unique technical challenges at scale, and helping to create safer, more civil shared experiences for everyone.

We're seeking a talented Senior 3D Animator to join our team at Roblox for a 6-month engagement. You'll focus on creating high-quality, foundational character animations for the Roblox platform—specifically basic ability and locomotion sets that bring avatars to life with polish and personality.

This is an exciting opportunity to contribute directly to core Roblox avatar experiences used by millions of players worldwide.

You Will:

• Create and refine a suite of standard locomotion and ability animations, including:
  • Idle poses (variations for personality/stance)
  • Walk, run, sprint cycles
  • Jump, land, fall animations
  • Other basic movement/ability actions as needed
• Deliver clean, weighty, and expressive animations optimized for Roblox's avatar system (R15 preferred)
• Iterate quickly based on feedback from animation leads, designers, and engineers
• Export animations properly for Roblox Studio integration (using compatible formats and best practices)
• Use SyncSketch (or similar) for review and approval workflows

You Have:

• Strong experience in character animation, with a focus on creating believable, game-ready locomotion and action animations
• Excellent acting skills through motion—conveying emotion, weight, timing, and personality in movement
• Proficiency in FACS-based facial animation (Facial Action Coding System) or equivalent high-quality facial rigging/expression work
• Expert-level skills in Autodesk Maya for animation production and Tools
• Familiarity with SyncSketch (or comparable online review/approval tools)
• Proven track record creating animations for video games (mobile, PC, or console experience a plus)
• Strong sense of timing, weight, anticipation, follow-through, and polish in game animation principles

For roles that are based at our headquarters in San Mateo, CA: The starting base pay for this position is as shown below. The actual base pay is dependent upon a variety of job‑related factors such as professional background, training, work experience, location, business needs and market demand. Therefore, in some circumstances, the actual hourly rate could fall outside of this expected range. This pay range is subject to change and may be modified in the future. Please note that not all benefits shown on this page are applicable to this temporary position.

Monthly Salary Range: $9,103 – $11,152 USD

Roles that are based in an office are onsite Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, with optional presence on Monday and Friday (unless otherwise noted).

Roblox provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. Roblox also provides reasonable accommodations to candidates with qualifying disabilities or religious beliefs during the recruiting process.

For US-based roles only, please note the Company may not be able to employ candidates for this role who have United States work authorization related to certain U.S. visa categories, or support future H‑1B sponsorship at this time.