Concept Artist / Illustrator

Your work gets projected on a wall, not scrolled past on a phone.

Reports to: Producer
Location: Hybrid — Redmond, WashingtonOn-site for team collaboration and playtesting.
Timing: Fall 2026 — start date arranged with you
Who it’s for: DigiPen alumni, any graduating class

About this role

A loading screen here is ten feet of painted art in a dark room, with a group standing in front of it deciding whether the next round looks worth playing. Key art does the same job on a venue wall and on the page where somebody books a bay.

So every piece has to hold a room and survive a projector, where the blacks come out grey. This role is weighted toward finished work — the paintings are the deliverable, not the boards on the way to them.

Every team either builds a new game for Obsidian or takes one already running in the bay and makes it better.

What you’ll do

Paint the pieces

Cover art and key art for each game mode — the image that makes a group pick that one next.
Loading and transition screens, treated as art people look at rather than filler.
Digitally painted in-mode assets: backdrops, set pieces and illustrated elements.

Own the look of the 2D

Establish a visual identity per mode that holds across a whole set of pieces, not one strong image and four weaker ones.
Keep the 2D coherent with the environment, character and UI work.
Take direction and iterate without losing the thing that made a piece good.

Make it survive the venue

Compose for projection and venue-scale display, accounting for limited contrast.
Deliver at the resolutions and formats the pipeline needs.
Produce key and cover art that holds up promotionally as well as in-product.

What we’re looking for

Required

DigiPen graduate — any graduating class
Portfolio demonstrating strong digital painting and illustration, with finished pieces rather than studies and sketch pages alone
Command of composition, value, colour, and lighting
Ability to hit a defined style and hold it consistent across a set of related pieces
Ability to take art direction and iterate on it

Ideal degree tracks

ideal, not mandatory — a strong illustrator from any track is welcome

BFA in Digital Art and Animation
MFA in Digital Arts

A master’s degree in any related field counts the same as the tracks above.

Preferred

Key art, cover art, or promotional illustration experience
Strong character and environment illustration
Experience painting for large-format or projected output
Familiarity with how painted assets get integrated into Unreal or Unity
Interest in themed entertainment or immersive experience design

Work in whatever tools you are fastest in — we care about the pieces, not the software that made them.

What you’ll learn

Illustrating for projection and for a physical venue, where scale and contrast decide what survives
Making a loading screen carry real weight instead of filling time
Holding a visual identity across a set of pieces under a deadline
Working alongside 3D and UI artists so the painted work belongs to the same world as everything else
Producing art with a commercial job to do — the piece that sells the round
Seeing your work at ten feet, in a dark room, in front of paying customers

Compensation

Total hours: 180 hours
Hourly rate: $23.50 / hour
Total earnings: $4,230.00
Expected pace: About 20 hours/week, roughly 9 weeks
Payment: Bi-weekly, direct deposit
Structure: 1099 contractor

The 180 hours are the commitment; the calendar is not. Twenty hours a week for about nine weeks is what we expect in practice, but the weeks don’t have to run consecutively and the pace can flex. We set a schedule with you at the start and work around holidays, travel, and your other commitments.

This is a part-time, paid position and does not include benefits.

How to apply

Apply for this role.

Email [email protected] with Concept Artist / Illustrator in the subject line. Send all four of these — an application missing one of them is hard to act on, and we would rather not have to come back and ask.

01Your resumeAttached to the email — PDF preferred.
02Your GPARequired. Include it in the email body.
03A link to your portfolioA video reel and a portfolio site are preferred. Make sure everything opens without a login.
04Your general availabilityThe days and hours you can be on-site and reachable, so we can plan collaboration and playtesting around the people on your team.

Apply — Concept Artist / Illustrator

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