Senior Lighting Artist for Real-Time Immersive VR/AR

Festybay; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 104,000 - 133,000; Full time

Job summary

Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) is seeking a highly talented Lighting Artist to design, implement, and optimize real-time lighting for immersive environments and characters, balancing cinematic lighting with VR/interactive performance. You will work with the Lighting Department Supervisor and cross-discipline teams to deliver polished visuals.

The role requires 5+ years in AAA lighting or VFX, strong color theory, and shader/PBR knowledge.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of production experience as a Lighting Artist or Lighting TD within AAA game development, feature animation, or high-end visual effects (VFX).
• Strong aesthetic command over color theory, cinematic staging, shadow composition, and real-world atmospheric behavior.
• Hands-on production experience with Unreal Engine, Unity, or an equivalent modern real-time game engine, covering both dynamic and baked lighting pipelines.
• In-depth understanding of Physically Based Rendering (PBR) pipelines, real-time shader implementations, subsurface scattering shaders, and VR rendering limitations.
• Fluency working in Windows environments alongside workload and version control tools (e.g., JIRA, Perforce).

Responsibilities

• Scene Composition: collaborate with Art Directors and lighting leads to build cinematic lighting for environments, hero characters, and interactive assets.
• Real-Time Workflows: leverage lightmap baking, dynamic lighting tools, IBL, light probes, and post-process volumes.
• Dynamic Sequencing: partner with Level Designers to animate lighting and time-of-day changes using level blueprints or engine sequencer tools.
• Performance Synchronization: ensure shaders, textures, and geometry meet aesthetic targets and frame-rate benchmarks.

Skills

Unreal Engine

Unity

PBR Knowledge

Shader Writing

Tools

Unreal Engine

Unity

Maya

Perforce

JIRA

Job description

Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) is seeking a highly talented Lighting Artist to design, implement, and optimize real-time lighting for immersive environments and characters, balancing cinematic lighting with VR/interactive performance. You will work with the Lighting Department Supervisor and cross-discipline teams to deliver polished visuals.

The role requires 5+ years in AAA lighting or VFX, strong color theory, and shader/PBR knowledge.