Senior Spine Animator
Summary
Senior Spine Animator creates expressive 2D character and prop animations for real-time games, builds production-ready Spine rigs, and collaborates with cross-functional teams to integrate assets into Unity and other engines.
Senior Spine Animator (Characters & Props for Games)
We are hiring a Senior Spine Animator for our client — a gaming product company creating stylized real-time interactive experiences for global audiences.
We’re looking for an experienced 2D Spine Animator with strong keyframe animation skills and solid production experience in game development. This role focuses on creating expressive character and prop animations for real-time gameplay, as well as building clean and production-ready Spine rigs for efficient integration into game engines.
The ideal candidate combines strong artistic taste, technical understanding, and the ability to work efficiently in a fast-paced collaborative production environment.
Responsibilities
Spine Animation Production
Create high-quality character animations with strong acting, personality, and emotional expression
Animate props, gameplay elements, and occasional UI components
Build clean, reusable, and production-friendly Spine rigs
Collaborate closely with animation leads, artists, and technical teams
Implement feedback efficiently throughout all production stages
Work within established visual styles while maintaining animation quality and consistency
Support asset integration workflows for Unity and other real-time pipelines
Pipeline & Workflow
Maintain full animation workflow:Rigging
Key poses
In-betweens
Secondary motion
Polish
Export & integration
Maintain organized file structures and naming conventions
Follow production tracking and task management processes
Collaborate with adjacent teams on asset preparation and optimization
Requirements
Must-Have
5+ years of experience in Spine 2D animation for games
Strong mastery of:Posing
Timing
Arcs
Weight
Acting
Emotional animation
Advanced Spine knowledge, including rig creation and animation workflows
Solid understanding of export, optimization, and integration pipelines
Experience working in collaborative cross-functional production teams
Strong communication and feedback implementation skills
English, Mandarin, or Ukrainian proficiency
Nice to Have
Experience with Photoshop or digital drawing tools
Familiarity with VFX and video editing workflows
Ability to draw poses, storyboards, animatics, or expression sheets
Experience with frame-by-frame or 3D animation
Experience working with Unity pipelines
What Success Looks Like
High-quality and expressive character animation
Clean, scalable, and production-friendly Spine rigs
Efficient collaboration across art and technical teams
Smooth integration into real-time game pipelines
Consistently polished animation quality across projects
What We Offer
Remote / hybrid flexibility
Optional relocation support
Hardware allowance
Flexible paid time off policy
Learning & development budget
International production environment
Long-term collaboration on stylized real-time products