Lead UI Artist

SEGA HARDlight is looking for a Lead UI Artist or a seasoned Senior UI artist with the propensity to lead our small but talented UI team, splitting your time across team management and creating art.

You will champion the UI team and studio values by empowering them - giving the team ownership and trust to deliver on their commitments while developing their skills and helping with their personal development.

The Lead UI Artist is key to creating a UI vision that balances the needs of the game design, high level art direction and the player’s experience. You will be hands on, creating highly compelling artwork that meets the visual and technical requirements of the game whilst serving as the benchmark for artistic excellence and work ethic.

You are a great communicator, able to effectively share ideas, plans, problems and able to get the team around you to focus on the core goals ahead.

Being part of the SEGA family most of our game’s visuals are stylised, vibrant and fun and this is right up your street – you love developing UI across mobile, console and PC platforms.

Duties

• Create high quality UI concepts, art and UX prototypes while giving direction and feedback to the UI team to ensure consistency and quality.
• Work with the game team to ensure the UI is implemented in engine maintaining the desired visuals and adhering to technical limitations.
• Work with the project stakeholders to drive and establish UI art and UX that balances the needs of the game vision, business goals and technical requirements.
• Help create and maintain UI pipelines and workflows that are efficient and work well with the needs of the projects and team.
• Oversee and mentor the UI team through appraisals, training and career development.
• Work with the UI team and producers to ensure the teams work is realistically planned and on track – ensuring we deliver something you’re proud of without crunch.
• Participate in recruitment to build your team.

Essential Skills & Experience

• Proven track record of delivering amazing UI on a range of shipped titles.
• Time management and organisational skills allowing you to plan your deliverables at both roadmap and sprint-level and know how to prioritise your team’s work for maximum impact.
• Happy to work independently; you get the job done without supervision and make smart choices with the information at hand.
• A good understanding of game production constraints and hands on experience of taking UI/UX from initial concepts to implemented in game.
• A keen eye for details in everything you and your team does.
• A willingness to learn new tech and tools, either in-house or industry developments to keep the team ahead of the curve.
• Strong interest and knowledge of UX best practices and accessibility.
• Expert knowledge of the Adobe Creative Suite.

A portfolio demonstrating all aspects of your skill is REQUIRED

Bonus experiences

• Development experience on a wide variety of mobile platforms.
• Practical experience of implementing interfaces using the Unity UI system or similar.
• Skills in animation and motion graphics (After Effects / Flash or similar).
• Knowledge of 3D packages for developing rendered icons and visuals.

Why work at HARDlight?

• You'll have access to a comprehensive benefits package that includes ULEV car salary sacrifice, life assurance, income protection, private healthcare & dental insurance schemes and an enhanced contributory pension scheme.
• We offer competitive salaries and a fantastic bonus scheme so that you can stay motivated and focused on making HARDlight the best it can be.
• 6 weeks work from home allowance.
• For gaming buffs, we offer free SEGA games on Steam and a home technology scheme, or if you’re more of a foodie, you can take advantage of fresh fruit, cereal & toast every day.
• Take advantage of our weekly training time and training budget to keep learning and improving your skills.
• Fitness fanatics will love our discounted gym membership and ride to work scheme. You can find your zen with weekly yoga classes as well as in-house massage therapy.
• We pride ourselves on having flexible working hours to ensure that you have a life outside of the office.
• The opportunity to be a large part of a small team, developing innovative titles with a huge SEGA back catalogue.
• Based in the ‘Heart of England' in stunning historic Royal Leamington Spa, with great connections to London & Birmingham.
• We want people of all backgrounds to see themselves represented and included in our work, so we actively seek to diversify our team and bring more voices to the table. All applicants are welcome!

This is an onsite hybrid role – 3 days in the office and 2 days from home.