What do Technical Artist do?

Technical art can be described as a field of study that companies dealing with computer graphics utilize to produce things like video games, animated films, AR/VR experiences, and VFX for live-action movies.

Technical artists are also responsible for bringing some much-needed realism to the picture. They are there to balance an artist’s creative freedom to be realistic and functional in a game or movie. If, for example, an artist creates a nefarious villain with super-spiky shoulder pads, then the TA’s job includes figuring whether or not those spikes might take the villain’s head off when he raises his arms. Just because they look really cool, doesn’t mean it’s a realistic option. If there’s a danger of imminent decapitation, that’s No Bueno and the TA will have to request a new design.

By hiring technical artists, a studio can divide the workload of developing and maintaining a game’s pipelines and tools between TAs and programmers. This, in turn, allows the programmers to concentrate on what they do best — develop game code. TAs collaborate with artists and programmers to make the game development process more streamlined, and that results in a win-win situation for everyone.