Character Art External Development Manager

Insomniac Games is looking for a Character Art External Development Manager. The Character Art External Development Manager is responsible for managing the full lifecycle of character art assets produced by external development vendors. This role serves as the primary point of contact between Insomniac Games' internal Character Art team and external partners, ensuring all outsourced work meets the studio's visual quality standards, adheres to art direction, and delivers on schedule. This is a production-facing role that requires both strong artistic judgment and rigorous project management capabilities.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Serve as the primary liaison between Insomniac Games and external development vendors, maintaining consistent communication across all active engagements.

• Author, review, and maintain detailed asset briefs for all ExDev character art work, including high-poly sculpts, low-poly/UV assets, and texture/material deliverables.

• Manage asset pipelines across milestone cycles, tracking bid estimates and delivery durations through Flow (ShotGrid).

• Coordinate handoffs between ExDev vendors and internal art teams, ensuring assets meet technical and visual requirements before engine integration.

• Collaborate with Project Directors to ensure budget remains on track for vendor work.

• Coordinate and facilitate Zoom meetings with vendor studios as required, including review sessions, kickoffs, and milestone check-ins.

• Proactively identify schedule risks and communicate them to stakeholders with mitigation plans.

Quality Assurance & Art Direction

• Evaluate all externally produced character art against established quality bars, style guides, and project art direction before approval.

• Work closely with the Lead Character Artist to define asset acceptance criteria and ensure feedback provided to vendors is aligned with the project's creative vision.

• Provide clear, actionable written feedback to external vendors, including annotated reference and redline documentation.

• Source and distribute benchmark assets and visual reference packages from internal teams, ensuring external vendors have the materials needed to hit quality targets.

Stakeholder Communication & Process

• Represent the ExDev pipeline in cross-department meetings with Production, Art Directors, and Mission Directors.

• Maintain ExDev status reports and capacity data for studio leadership visibility.

• Document and improve ExDev processes, including brief templates, review protocols, and vendor onboarding materials.

• Work effectively across significant time zone differences with overseas external development partners, managing communication windows to maintain production momentum.

• Other duties may be assigned.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience in character art production within AAA game development, film, or equivalent industry.

• Demonstrated experience managing external development vendors, including writing asset briefs and conducting formal reviews.

• Shipped at least one AAA title with significant external development involvement preferred.

Technical Skills

• Strong working knowledge of the full character art pipeline: high-poly ZBrush sculpting, low-poly/UV creation in Maya, and texturing/materials in Substance Painter.

• Proficiency with PBR shading workflows and understanding of how materials are exported and set up in Unreal Engine or equivalent.

• Experience with Flow (formerly ShotGrid/Shotgun) for production tracking and asset management.

• Familiarity with source control via Perforce or equivalent.

• Understanding of rigging, animation, and design constraints that affect character asset creation.

Soft Skills & Competencies

• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills; able to convey complex artistic feedback clearly and diplomatically to non-native English speakers and remote teams.

• Strong organizational and prioritization skills with the ability to manage multiple vendor relationships and asset streams simultaneously.

• High degree of autonomy and accountability; proactively identifies and resolves production issues without requiring close oversight.

• Collaborative and solutions-oriented mindset with a track record of building strong working relationships with external partners.

• Ability to navigate ambiguity, manage changing priorities, and advocate for realistic timelines with leadership.