VFX & Cinematic Artist

First Fun; Santa Clara (CA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

First Fun in Santa Clara is seeking a unique VFX & Cinematic Artist to own real-time gameplay VFX for our Unity-based mobile RTS and high-impact cinematic marketing content that drives user acquisition.

You will ship in-game effects, craft shaders, optimize for mobile, and produce promotional videos from storyboard to final cut, collaborating with Art Director to ensure a unified visual identity.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of combined experience across cinematic/trailer production and in-game VFX.
• Strong fundamentals in real-time game engines and in-engine cinematic tools (Unreal, Unity).
• Solid understanding of shader and material authoring using Shader Graph, Amplify Shader Editor, HLSL, or equivalent.
• Knowledge of mobile rendering performance and optimization.

Responsibilities

• Design and implement in-game real-time VFX for combat, spell effects, destruction, weather, and ambience.
• Craft shaders and materials for effects (dissolves, distortion, energy) with performance awareness.
• Optimize effects for mobile performance without sacrificing visual quality.
• Produce short game promo ads end-to-end from storyboard/previz to final delivery, including blocking, lighting, rendering, and handoff.
• Collaborate with Art Director to iterate on promotional creatives based on performance metrics and maintain a coherent visual identity across in-game and marketing content.
• Lead AI-assisted workflows to speed up previz, variant exploration, and asset cleanup while maintaining craftsmanship.

Skills

VFX design

Cinematic storytelling

Real-time rendering

Creative collaboration

AI-assisted workflows

Tools

Unity

Unreal

Blender

Maya

After Effects

Premiere

DaVinci Resolve

Shader Graph

Amplify Shader Editor

HLSL

EmberGen

Substance Designer

Job description

We are looking for a unique VFX & Cinematic Artist to own two deeply connected crafts: real-time gameplay VFX for our Unity-based mobile RTS, and high-impact cinematic marketing content (UA ads, trailers) that drives player acquisition.

While this is a hybrid role, we don't expect you to be a 100/100 master of both crafts on day one. If you are a world-class gameplay VFX artist with a strong instinct for cinematic storytelling—or vice versa, we want to talk to you.

Why This Unique Dual Role?

In our pipeline, gameplay and marketing directly feed each other:

• Game to Ad: The real-time VFX you build in Unity becomes the core visual foundation for our marketing trailers and UA creatives.
• Ad to Game: The cinematography, pacing, and visual storytelling you hone while creating ads make your in-game effects significantly more impactful and readable.

Our AI Philosophy

AI is a core part of our creative workflow. We actively leverage generative and assistive tools across production—from rapid storyboarding and previs to upscaling and frame interpolation. We aren't looking for someone who simply uses AI; we want an artist who knows how to leverage AI to speed up iteration while knowing when traditional craftsmanship delivers superior quality.

What You’ll Do

Real-Time Gameplay VFX

• Design and implement in-game real-time VFX: combat impacts, spell and ability effects, destruction, weather, and particulate atmosphere.
• Craft custom shaders and materials for effects work — dissolves, distortion, flipbooks, refraction, energy, and elemental looks — and understand the performance cost of every feature you add.
• Optimize effects, shaders, scenes, and render settings for mobile performance budgets and fast turnaround, without sacrificing visual quality.

Cinematic Marketing Production

• Produce short game promotion ads end-to-end from storyboard or previz/animatic to final delivery — blocking, camera work, lighting, sequencing, rendering, and handoff.
• Translate marketing briefs and storyboards into short lists and animatics/previz, then produce them into final video clips.
• Partner with the Art Director to iterate on promotional creatives based on performance metrics — cut, re-time, re-light, re-cut, ship again.
• Use AI tools to compress the production cycle — rapid previz and storyboard exploration, generating creative variants for testing, automating repetitive cleanup, and shortening the path from brief to first cut.
• Evaluate new AI tooling as it lands, and fold what actually works into the team's pipeline. Discard what doesn't.
• Partner with the Art Director on both in-game content and cinematic work — interpreting the art direction, presenting work for review, and iterating on notes until the effects and the ads hold a single, coherent visual identity.
• Establish and maintain a consistent visual language so promotional work and in-game effects feel like they belong to the same world.
• Build reusable templates, material libraries, and effect libraries that shorten the runway on the next campaign or feature.
• Maintain a clean, organized project structure and clear asset naming so others can seamlessly pick up your work.

What We’re Looking For

• 5+ years of combined experience across cinematic/trailer production and in-game VFX for games. You don't need identical depth in both, but you need real production experience in each — this role cannot be learned from zero on either side.
• Strong fundamentals in at least one real-time game engine or in-engine cinematic toolset (Unreal, Unity, or a proprietary in-house editor). We care that you understand real-time lighting, sequencing, and rendering — not which logo is on the splash screen.
• Strong understanding of shader and material authoring using Shader Graph, Amplify Shader Editor, HLSL, or equivalent.
• Solid understanding of mobile rendering performance and optimization (managing overdraw, shader complexity, and draw calls).
• Strong understanding of cinematography, composition, pacing, camera language, and lighting.
• Proficient with DCC tools (Blender, Maya) and post-production software (After Effects, Premiere, or DaVinci Resolve).
• Demonstrated use of AI tools in a production context — generative image or video models, AI-assisted previz or storyboarding, upscaling, frame interpolation, roto or matte generation, or prompt-driven variant creation. You should be able to talk about where these tools helped, where they failed, and how you told the difference.

Nice to Have

• Experience shipping mobile games titles, particularly in the RTS, SLG, MOBA, or Strategy genres, or promotional creative that ran at scale on video social media platforms.
• Understanding of what makes short-form video and playable promos actually convert — hook timing, first-two-seconds discipline, CTA placement.
• Experience building AI-assisted workflows others can use — reusable prompt libraries, batch pipelines, or tooling that turns a manual step into an automated one.
• Understanding of user acquisition, creative performance, and A/B testing.
• Experience with Unreal Engine (Niagara, Sequencer) for cinematic production.
• Experience with EmberGen, Substance Designer, or other flipbook and texture generation tools.
• Houdini for simulation work (destruction, fluids, cloth) baked down for real-time use.
• Scripting for procedural or data-driven shot setups (Blueprint, Python, C#).

*Please note: candidates moving forward in the interview process will be required to complete a short, non-paid take-home VFX assessment.