Art Director: Media & VFX (Temporary to Staff)

About the role

Local Projects is a multi-disciplinary design studio best known for technologically advanced work that drives emotional engagement. Founded over 20 years ago, our NYC-based studio produces best-in-class, groundbreaking projects worldwide. Reporting to the Director of Visual Experience Design, with Creative Director leadership on projects, the Art Director: Media & VFX leads teams of designers, animators, and editors to deliver innovative, cohesive solutions across physical and digital environments. This is a technical and creative role requiring expertise in media design with a strong focus on VFX, including photoreal CG character and environmental development, immersive scenes and backgrounds, physical design, and AV hardware systems, all within interactive narrative spaces. The role also calls for hands-on experience in 3D and game engine workflows to build immersive worlds.

Responsibilities

• Lead with a technical and creative design process that embraces experimentation, iteration, and challenges conventions
• Design with empathy, ensuring ADA accessibility across physical environments
• Communicate design concepts, processes, and technical requirements clearly to teams and clients
• Translate project strategies into actionable technical and creative design direction in partnership with project leads
• Work within a unified design system and thematic narrative across phases of work and across disciplines
• Coordinate technical and design dependencies, keeping budget, spec, and production constraints in mind
• Flag challenges early and propose timely, thoughtful solutions
• Manage multiple projects and consistently meet deadlines
• Lead and participate in design reviews and working sessions
• Support team members with actionable feedback and ongoing development
• Stay current on industry practices and technical advancements, and share them with teammates
• Contribute to studio-wide best practices and help evolve department standards

Skills & Qualifications

• Experience as a CG design/artist lead in the animation and visual effects industry
• Experience leveraging current AI workflows and models to improve pipeline efficiency
• On-set Visual Effects Supervisor experience preferred
• Exceptional design sensibility paired with strong technical expertise and conceptual thinking
• Expert in CG software (Maya, Cinema4D, Unreal, or Unity)
• Experience with CG character pipelines and character VFX (e.g., motion capture or live-action face replacement)
• Familiarity with emerging AI support and efficiency tools (excluding character creation)