Pleasant Solutions Careers

Positions Available:

• Full time 3d character animator
• Other Positions: We are also hiring for 3D generalist animators (non-character), video editor, motion designer, sound designer, director of photography (focus on artisting lighting), and more. You may apply for multiple positions separately. If you know someone in any of these areas, please do them a quick and friendly favour by letting them know about this posting.

Position Overview:

• Full time and permanent
• Flexible hours (for example: choose to start your day between 6am and 10am, work late some days and shorter on others).
• 85% internal projects (for multiple product lines), 15% client projects.
• Focus on achieving noticeably remarkable and portfolio-worthy results, with only some projects that simply need to be done in a short timeframe (we aim to win awards for our work).
• The same variety as working at an agency, but without the cutting corners to deliver too quickly.
• Engage in constructive debate to challenge your artistic choices; standing up for your choices, while being willing to use respectful criticism, with or without the sugar coating, to iterate into even better designs.
• Focus on 3D animation of characters, both human and non-human characters.
• Facial expressions and body movement of characters.
• Both designing the character movements (such as blocking) as well as fine tuning all details of the movement to reach cinematic quality levels.
• Animation will be either from scratch or starting with performance/motion capture as a starting point.
• Tweaking blend shapes where the existing blend shapes are insufficient for a given scene.
• Assist with modelling characters and rigging charaters where your skills allow.
• Occasionally assist 3D generalist or visual effects teams where your skills allow.
• Gain experience with numerous video types: entertainment videos (like Sci-Fi short stories), animated explainer videos, YouTube commercials, infographic videos, mixing live action with 3D, and short snippits for social media.
• Does not involve constant tight deadlines nor overtime that lead to results you are not proud of; there is pressure but it is manageable and work has steady hours.
• High end equipment to work with (triple monitors with a 40” monitor, pen tablets, whatever keyboard or mouse you want us to buy, etc).

Requirements:

• Passionate about video storytelling with emotion and movement specifically
• Can be very fast for prototyping and pre-visualizations, but can dig deep for stunning results
• Superb understanding of factors that affect perception of quality and engagement of viewers
• Attention to detail
• Takes pride in work
• No specific requirements for formal education or industry experience. We evaluate each applicant based on merit and potential rather than formalities, however a portfolio is required.

Nice To Have:

• Experience with Maya or Cinema 4D
• Experience in a wide variety of animations (expressive as well as subtle)

About The Work Environment:

• Friendly, non-threatening, and non-political environment.
• Mid-sized company but retaining the speed and flexibility of a smaller company.
• We are a great environment for both outgoing people and those who are very shy and introverted (applicable to non-client facing positions).
• We strive to have every employee sitting near a window for natural light and to have plenty of plants throughout the office; we care about employee health.
• Free onsite massage therapy.
• Private nap rooms for isolated thinking time or for taking a nap if you didn’t sleep well last night.
• Atrium to enjoy the sun during lunch.
• Social events worth remembering (fencing competitions, curling, video game or board game parties, coding competitions, commando combat training, robotics club coming soon, etc).
• An example of our culture: Lunch together is in a very comfy sofa room, and even the quiet types are comfortable there.
• Unlimited access to pillage our kitchens for caffeine, sugar, healthy snacks, soups, and more :)
• Additional perks that are cost-shared like motorized sit-stand desks.
• Task focused: everyone in the company heavily uses centralized to-do lists to stay organized, prioritize, and coordinate.
• Fast paced
• Consistent work/life balance: mandatory overtime is very rare.

About The Company:

• Pleasant Solutions is a dynamic company headquartered in Edmonton, a large satellite office in Toronto and Vancouver, and small satellite offices across Canada (including in Calgary, Ottawa, etc).
• We have just recently launched a studio for our own innovative video productions as well as client contracted productions, but we have also been an enterprise software services company since 2007.
• The studio team has won multiple awards already.
• We are the most advanced video studio in Western Canada. We might also be, although not fully confirmed, the largest capacity video marketing studio in Western Canada except for television and news stations.
• Silicon Valley kind of excitement and growth potential.
• Fast growth: One of the 200 fastest growing technology companies in North America with 955% growth over 5 years (based on growth rates in published rankings of the 2014 Profit 500 and 2013 Deloitte Technology Fast 500). Canadian Profit Guide ranked us #88 out of 500 for fast growth in Canada, announced in Sept 2015.
• Stable and well diversified.
• Full of smart and passionate people whom you can learn from.
• Very low employee turn-over rate, attesting to the value of working here.
• As of 2021, we are more focused on in-house product development than previous years which had a focus on consulting services. Currently, our lead focus is on Sheetcast, a tool that lets non-technical people build their own full-blown web applications using spreadsheets, and which is beginning explosive growth (see https://Sheetcast.com) as well as privacy products as seen under Paranoid.com. We still do some software development services, electronics manufacturing, marketing services, and IT services. Other in-house products include the high-security Pleasant Password Server.
• An innovative technology company with an aim of achieving results in creative ways.
• Socially conscious (for example, we pay for employees to sponsor hundreds of WorldVision children).
• Achieved zero layoffs throughout Covid.

Applying:

• What do you have to lose by exploring the possibility? Applying does not take long and we keep your application confidential (never disclosed to existing employer).
• Apply online today at https://pleasantsolutions.com/careers/apply/3d-character-animator
• Even if you don't have your resume updated or ready to go, apply anyway; we want to hear from you!
• Please do not apply via email, apply only by visiting the https://pleasantsolutions.com/careers/apply/3d-character-animator site.

Keywords:

• 3d character animation
• 3d character animator
• 3D animation
• 3D animator
• 3d character design
• 3d character rigging
• 3d character modelling
• 3d character modeling
• post production graphics
• motion graphic design
• motion graphic designer
• video production
• cinema character
• film character
• lead 3d character animator
• face animation
• performance capture
• motion capture
• video animation
• video animator
• video commercial production
• social media video
• advertising
• creative director
• creative lead
• Autodesk Maya
• cinema 4d
• adobe after effects
• Plurals:
• 3d character animations
• 3d character animators
• 3D animations
• 3D animators
• 3d character designs
• 3d character rigs
• 3d character models
• motion graphic designs
• motion graphic designers
• video productions
• cinema characters
• film characters
• lead 3d character animators
• face animations
• performance captures
• motion captures
• video animations
• video animators
• video commercial productions
• social media videos
• creative directors
• creative leads