Senior Technical Artist

Boeing Boeing · Aerospace · Brisbane, Australia, Australia

Senior Technical Artist at Boeing, focusing on building high-fidelity visualizations and training applications using Unreal Engine. The role involves bridging art and engineering, developing tools and workflows, optimizing pipelines, and ensuring performance and quality for safety-critical aerospace projects. Requires expertise in Unreal Engine, 3D tools, scripting, and optimization for desktop and VR/AR.

What you'd actually do

  1. Prototype & R&D: Develop proof‑of‑concept visual features (e.g., cockpit displays, fluid dynamics, terrain rendering) in Unreal Engine; evaluate emerging technologies for aerospace use.
  2. Art‑Engineering Liaison: Translate aerospace requirements (e.g., accurate material properties, lighting for sensor simulations) into art pipeline specifications and ensure they are met throughout development.
  3. Tool Support & Training: Provide technical assistance to artists and engineers using 3D tools (Maya, Blender, Substance) and Unreal Engine, troubleshooting integration issues and ensuring compatibility across desktop and VR/AR platforms.
  4. Pipeline Development: Design, document, and maintain robust pipelines for importing CAD data, rigging hard surface models, creating shaders and managing large‑scale environments that support frequent content updates and version control.
  5. Workflow Optimization: Identify bottlenecks in asset preparation, rendering and simulation runtimes. Implement custom scripts, plugins or off‑the‑shelf solutions to improve efficiency and reduce iteration time.

Skills

Required

  • 4 + years experience as a technical artist in a professional environment.
  • Proven track record delivering high‑fidelity visual content for games, aerospace, defence or scientific visualization projects.
  • Expert proficiency in Unreal Engine 5 (Blueprints, Material Editor) and related toolsets (Maya, Blender, Substance, Photoshop).
  • Ability to create editor extensions, custom import pipelines, and automation scripts in Python and C#.
  • Experience with rigging, animation, shader development and real‑time implementation of complex 3D assets.
  • Demonstrated skill in performance optimization for both desktop and VR/AR platforms, including profiling, LOD strategies and texture streaming.
  • Service‑oriented mindset for supporting cross‑disciplinary teams.
  • Ability to create runbooks and technical documentation.
  • Business acumen to align operational decisions with product/service objectives.
  • Comfortable with Agile development practices.

Nice to have

  • Experience with flight‑simulation or pilot‑training systems.
  • Hands‑on work with VR/AR hardware and optimization techniques.
  • A proven track record of shipping at least one commercial game, demonstrating end‑to‑end development and successful launch.
  • Strong grasp of aerospace visualization needs: accurate material shading, sensor simulation, physics‑based rendering and large‑scale terrain/atmospheric effects.
  • Strong ability to influence cross-functional teams, drive operational outcomes, and mentor junior engineers.
  • Decision-making under pressure and ownership of platform reliability.
  • Bachelor’s degree in computer science, engineering, game development, or related field

What the JD emphasized

  • highly regulated, safety‑critical environment
  • real‑time rendering constraints