Senior Crowds Technical Artist

Skydance Media is hiring a Senior Crowds Technical Artist based in Madrid to join their animation production team. This role sits within the crowds department and is responsible for building master crowd rigs, setting up agents in Houdini, and delivering simulation-ready assets that go directly into production shots. It suits a technically grounded VFX pipeline professional who has worked crowd systems on animated features and knows how to bridge the gap between rigging, simulation, and final output.

About the Role

The Senior Crowds Technical Artist works alongside the Crowds Supervisor and Lead on assigned sequences, supporting a team of crowd artists through both the asset build and shot execution phases. Day to day, that means building and testing HDAs within the Houdini pipeline, troubleshooting shot-specific issues, and ensuring crowd behaviors hold up to the quality bar of animated film production. The role carries a mentorship dimension, with the expectation that you are actively developing the artists around you.

Key Responsibilities

• Set up crowd assets and Houdini Digital Assets within the existing VFX pipeline, testing new procedures under the direction of the Crowds Lead and Supervisor.
• Build a range of crowd agents including bipeds, quadrupeds, and vehicles, optimized for efficient simulation at feature film scale.
• Execute crowd behaviors on production shots to the highest quality standards, resolving technical challenges independently where required.
• Provide hands-on support and technical guidance to Crowd Animators across the department, contributing to their professional development.
• Feed notes and workflow observations back to department TDs to drive ongoing tool development within the crowds pipeline.
• Stay current on crowd simulation methodology and emerging tools relevant to animation studio production environments.

What You Bring

• Five or more years of experience in VFX or animation, with at least three of those years in an animation production environment.
• Deep working knowledge of the Houdini Crowd system, applied in a production context on animated films or comparable projects.
• Proficiency in Maya and Houdini within live production pipelines, including procedural rendering in Renderman.
• A thorough understanding of the full CG pipeline from asset creation through to lighting.
• A high level of English is desirable, and Spanish is a plus given the Madrid studio location.

Why This Role

Skydance Media has built a production slate that spans animated features, live action, and interactive, giving technical artists genuine breadth of long-term opportunity within a single studio. This position places you at a senior level within a structured crowds department on feature film production, with real influence over pipeline development and team growth.

Apply now for the Senior Crowds Technical Artist role at Skydance Media and take the next step in your feature animation career.