AWN Career Connections

Lighting Supervisor

The Lighting Supervisor is responsible for leading a team of lighting artists to create direct and reflecting lighting and shadows that meet creative direction and has shared accountability for the management and deliverables of the lighting department. The incumbent will serve as the creative and technical lead in incorporating existing designs, new designs and creating lighting of graphic character objects, scene images and effects for designated sequences.

The incumbent is also responsible for the films style, lighting design, implementation and textural look of the movie. The incumbent will consult within the team of the Production Designer, Art Director, CG Supervisor, VFX Supervisor, Modeling Supervisor and Producers regarding implementing design ideas technically through software and methodology. He/she will oversee the lighting team ensuring consistency and quality through technical workflows. More directly, the Lighting Supervisor will report to and collaborate with the VFX Supervisor.

Duties & Responsibilities

    * Regularly interacting with the Producer, Director, and Production Designer to understand desired look as it relates to lighting for the production.
    * Ensuring the rendering of assigned characters and sequences.
    * Delivering final shots to production and ensuring final technical check is complete.
    * Tracking lighting continuity within sequences.
    * Accountable for on-time, on-budget execution and delivery, as well as quality of required lighting for the sequence.
    * Translating specific operating plans into assignments and deliverables for the lighting team.
    * Participating in estimating resource requirements, budgets, schedules and performance standards.
    * Monitoring and adjusting daily assignments and priorities.
    * Ensuring that the lighting team has sufficient guidelines for art / technology and related tools to meet the plan.
    * Ensuring the training and mentoring of direct reports.
    * Conducting performance reviews and providing immediate performance feedback.
    * Creating and executing detailed work plans to attain creative / technical / business / productivity objectives.
    * Participating in establishing the production's short-term objectives.
    * Collaborating across departments to resolve persistent technical or content-based problems.
    * Interacting with subordinates, peers and/or managers in other departments on issues of production plans and tactical procedures.

Core Competencies

    * Directing others establishes clear directions and sets objectives; distributes the workload appropriately, lays out work in a well-planned and organized manner; maintains two-way dialogue with others on work and results, brings out the best in people; a clear communicator.
    * Managing and measuring work - clearly assign responsibility for tasks and decisions, sets clear objectives and measures them; monitors process, progress, and results; designs feedback loop into work.
    * Planning Accurately scopes out length and difficulty of tasks and projects; sets objectives and goals, breaks down work into steps; develops schedules and task/people assignments; anticipates and adjusts for problem and roadblocks; measures performance against goals; evaluates results.
    * Priority Setting Spends his/her time and the time of others on whats important; quickly zeros in on the critical few and puts the trivial many aside; can quickly sense what will help or hinder accomplishing a goal; eliminates roadblocks; creates focus.
    * Problem Solving uses rigorous logic and methods to solve difficult problems with effective solutions; probes all fruitful sources for answers; can see hidden problems; is excellent at honest analysis; looks beyond the obvious and doesnt stop at the first answer.

Qualifications

    * Expert knowledge of Maya, and various render software. Expert knowledge of shaders and shader development.
    * Expert knowledge of Nuke (preferred) or Shake and compositing experience required.
    * Mental Ray and RenderMan experience in a production environment preferred
    * Expert knowledge of lighting rig setup and shot specific lighting tools within Maya, with experience setting up advanced lighting.
    * 7-10 years of experience with 2 or more years of lead / supervisory experience.
    * Prior experience of CG output to film required.
    * Knowledge of UNIX/Linux, procedural and object-oriented programming languages is an asset.
    * Must have thorough knowledge of colour theory and lighting techniques.
    * Demonstrated ability in making aesthetic judgement calls.
    * Degree in Fine Arts, computer science, or equivalent work experience.

Rainmaker
Where Worlds Are Created.

We're a creatively collaborative, full service CG animation studio in Vancouver Canada with an innovative history that spans over 15 years. Originally established as Mainframe Entertainment, the award winning CG company was acquired in 2006 by one of Vancouver's most well known entertainment businesses to become Rainmaker Entertainment.

With over 200 artists, directors and technical staff, our studio provides a full service environment for clients and creative partners. We can do it all - design, casting, recording, modeling, layout, animation, motion capture, lighting and post production. Our highly scalable and adaptable pipeline features artist friendly tools and allows us to create CG animation styles that are unique to each project. We don't limit ourselves.