Software Engineer Rendering – Netflix Animation Studios

Job Position(s): Software Engineer Rendering - Netflix Animation Studios

Netflix is hiring a Software Engineer Rendering at Netflix Animation Studios, based in Vancouver, Canada. This role sits inside the core R&D group responsible for developing and maintaining Glimpse, the studio’s proprietary rendering engine, including its raytracer, shading system, and scene representation tools that feed directly into feature film animation production. It’s a fit for a computer graphics engineer with deep rendering pipeline experience who wants their code running inside actual animated films.

About the Role

The Software Engineer Rendering works within a small, self-directed R&D team embedded in the animation studio pipeline, building the systems that lighting, shading, and compositing artists depend on every day. You’re not supporting an off-the-shelf renderer, you’re authoring one, which means your work has a direct line to the image quality that ends up on screen. The role is hybrid, requiring a minimum of three days per week at the Vancouver studio.

Key Responsibilities

• Develop and extend all layers of the Glimpse rendering engine, covering scene representation, sampling, raytracing, and the shading system used across animated feature film production.
• Build and maintain production tools that integrate directly into lighting, shading, and compositing workflows used by artists on active projects.
• Implement physically based light transport and global illumination techniques, applying Monte Carlo integration and importance sampling to achieve photorealistic rendering results.
• Write high-performance, vectorized C++ code with attention to parallel programming, compiler optimization, and efficient spatial data structures.
• Work directly with technically minded lighting and shading artists to design features, gather feedback, and deploy solutions rapidly into the production pipeline.
• Contribute to GPU and multi-threaded CPU rendering research, including raytracing and shading algorithms on massively parallel architectures.

What You Bring

• Five or more years of experience developing 3D rendering software in C++ within high performance computing environments.
• A Master’s or PhD in Computer Science, Mathematics, Physics, Engineering, or equivalent applied research experience in computer graphics.
• Working knowledge of shading languages including OSL, RSL, and GLSL, plus exposure to libraries such as Embree and OpenImageIO.
• Familiarity with DCC applications used in animation studio pipelines, particularly Houdini and Maya, including their APIs.
• A background in film, animation, games, or visualization, or strong academic research credits in rendering and light simulation.

Why This Role

Netflix Animation Studios is building a proprietary rendering and VFX pipeline from the ground up to support its animated feature film slate across three global studio locations, which means engineers here are making foundational decisions rather than maintaining inherited systems. The overall compensation range for this Software Engineer Rendering position is $124,000 to $179,000 CAD, reflecting total compensation with no stock options, plus benefits covering medical, dental, vision, mental health support, retirement programs, and paid leave.

Apply now for the Software Engineer Rendering role at Netflix Animation Studios and put your rendering pipeline work directly into animated feature film production.