The intermediary between disciplines, the bridge between art and programming. Atomhawk’s tech art and engineering department facilitates a smoother development process and faster running games, optimised and harnessing cutting edge features, whether running on Unreal Engine 5, Unity or your own proprietary engine.
Technical Art
Elegant solutions
for complex
gamedev problems.
Why work with Atomhawk’s Tech Art team?
Because we believe game creation is equal parts art, engineering, and magic. We ask what can be done, and what hasn’t been done before. We challenge the hardware, the software and the tech to find efficiencies and optimise performance, in both your development pipeline and your game.
Goal-oriented problem solving. With technical knowledge built on broad experience, our team solves real-time problems, bringing creativity and analytical thinking to push your technology to the limit. Rigorous testing, attention to detail and platform specific profiling makes for visuals that work as good as they look.
Whether working independently or collaborating with client teams, our technical art solutions are made-to-measure and unique, each and every time.
Save time and money with early project onboarding
From pre-production to post-launch, our experience saves development teams from getting stuck in blind avenues. “We wish we brought you on sooner” is a common response from clients. Why is that? The earlier we are embedded in a project and see its plan of implementation, the sooner we can suggest proactive pipeline efficiencies, rather than be a reactive clean-up crew.
• Shorter iteration times
• Specific engine optimised development
• Less bugs, shorter QA cycle
Optimisation is everything. We can work with profilers, cut down draw calls, push up frame rates, optimise assets and automate DCC processes. And if you can’t commit to a whole team early, it’s not a problem, start small and scale later.
• Pipeline set-up assistance
• Target platform alignment
• Tool discovery, creation and education
• Technical research & development
• Prototype systems
The real value of Tech Art: bespoke tools and plugins
When artists and designers are empowered through tools, they create more inspiring work. Tools are our passion area and at the heart of what we do. That can be extensions to your toolset: plugins for Maya or Unreal, simplifying software for less technical devs, or automating processes to combat human error. Teams will be encouraged to explore new workflows to push on quality. And they’ll get there faster.
Every little efficiency makes a difference. Our team has the experience to create proprietary tools, or we can recommend existing resources to improve workflows. We’re not just engineers but educators too, we knowledge share with teams on ways to get the most out of the programs they’re using. Even something as simple as a script that allows a person to condense five button clicks into one, can save time and money.
• Bespoke tool development
• Houdini assets
• Plugins for Unreal Engine, Unity, Maya, Photoshop and Blender
Your multidisciplinary translators
Tech Artists are the bridge between programmers and artists. With so much software and hardware being developed and improved every day, we occupy that middle ground. We speak the languages of all departments to smooth out the development process and make robust games. So, we’ve had to hone some really good communication skills.
Were often employed to be the connection between internal creative departments and more technical team on the client side. The team’s in-depth connection to projects from start to finish ensures that they bring all parties together to solve the inevitable issues arising from designing original content for unpredictable players using innovative controllers.
A personal strike team of engine & software expertise
We solve technical art problems others can’t, powered by leading industry tools. We’re set up to work in-engine and are backed by an ISO accredited secure IT infrastructure. Our team works in the software and engines that power the world’s top games. Whether you’re building in Unreal Engine, Unity, or proprietary engines, we embed ourselves to your workflow and technical requirements. Our software expertise is industry standard, working in Houdini, Blender, Maya, 3ds Max, Substance Suite and Photoshop.
Utilise our decades of niche expertise to plug the gaps in your team. Whether tools from scratch or the engine is your own, we can’t wait to get stuck in, find its strengths and idiosyncrasies, and learn to make it sing with you.
Pipeline Assessment
We can consult with your team and assess your pipeline and workflows, leveraging our expertise to implement high-impact solutions and improvements.
Optimisation
Achieving the desired performance is key to every game project. Our team can help with graphical and art optimisation, benchmarking and profiling to hit key performance targets with minimal impact on visual quality.
Materials & Shaders
Our Technical Artists are experts in shaders and material creation and implementation. Hyper realistic visual or stylised looks, we can deliver high quality, performant shaders in any game engine and optimise them for every platform.
Procedural Content
We can create procedural content generation systems and tools to intelligently automate the process of content creation, resulting in faster and more efficient workflows while leveraging our user centric approach will ensure that the systems will be intuitive to use.
Porting Support
Our teams of experienced cross-platform developers can work embedded in your team or operate in a satellite capacity to provide support and expertise when porting your project across platforms or engines.
Bespoke Tools
We create user centric, bespoke tools designed to not only be performant but also easy and pleasant to use. Designed around your problems, we offer solutions that can fully integrate into your engine, pipeline or content creation programs.
Working with
Technical Art can help solve complex challenges on creative projects. Ready to find out more about how we can work together?
What types of tech art does Atomhawk provide?
We provide a great variety of technical art services: from working directly on a game, improving performance through the optimisation of assets, materials, shaders and techniques, to creating tools for developers to get the very best out of their engines, be that Unreal Engine, Unity or propriety. Additionally, we provide technical assistance for procedural content generation, VFX, lighting and atmospherics, as well as consultation and R&D support to help clients nail down a new visual style.
Our Technical Art team embeds with client teams to solve problems, and optimise games and development pipelines. We can design bespoke solutions or provide implementation support according to client needs.
How experienced is Atomhawk’s tech art studio team?
We have several Tech Artists (TAs) and are rapidly expanding. Our current team ranges from a minimum of five years industry experience to nearly thirty. We’ve worked on just about every gaming platform from indie games to AAA, stylised and realistic. Our baseline of high technical competence–shared by all our TAs–range from programmers with technical art skills, to technical artists with programming skills.
Can Atomhawk deliver tech art projects with tight deadlines?
Yes, we can produce high quality results even with tight deadlines. Our no-crunch policy is achieved by thorough scoping and planning carried out by our production team, one of which is assigned to every project. Our producers track progress and deploy Agile methodologies to ensure we can adapt to the dynamic challenges of game development.
What is Atomhawk’s typical turnaround time with tech art projects?
As the range of work we do varies from project to project, all turnaround times are unique. Our team embeds with our clients and work with them for however long the project requires: this could be for the entirety of a project, providing support where required, or being present to make tools and implement content required for a specific aspect of a project, or at the end to help with bug fixing and optimisation.
How does Atomhawk ensure the end result for tech art matches my vision?
We work collaboratively with clients to ensure the agreed benchmark is achieved with quality and consistency. Before beginning every engagement, we have in-depth meetings with the client team on the project’s unique needs and approach to reduce feedback loops, time and cost.
Our in-house production team is essential to achieving high quality results for our clients. Many of our engagements involve more than one of our discipline teams, which is why a producer is assigned to every project. This producer manages account relations, project assets, and team schedule.
How do I submit a project to Atomhawk for tech art outsourcing?
You can contact our business development or production people or, alternatively use our website’s contact form.
We have an efficient qualification process which all new enquiries go through. First, an NDA will be signed. Then RFP’s, rate cards and bespoke creds decks can be requested by the new client. We will work in collaboration with you to meet your timescale, budget and project needs.
What is Atomhawk’s embedding process for tech art projects?
Our team becomes a part of your team. We adopt your processes, adhere to your guidelines and attend all the internal meetings you require us in. Our team will plug in to your hierarchy at whatever point you need, communicating directly with your leads to ensure the clearest possible communication.
Typically, this is achieved over the course of 1-2 weeks of onboarding at the start and is maintained through the project, with the oversight of our production staff, who will conduct regular check in’s with your leadership.
What software and pipelines does Atomhwk’s tech art team use?
Our Technical Art team is happy to adopt and adapt to whatever pipelines and software you require, and a key part of our work is often creating tools for our clients’ pipelines.
Our current software experience includes:
- Unreal Engine 5
- Unity
- Blender, Maya & 3d Studio Max
- Substance suite
- Houdini
- Perforce
- Git
- Visual Studio/Visual Code
- Jira
- Confluence
As part of utilizing this software we have experience with the following languages:
- C++
- C#
- Python
- HLSL
- Lua
- Typescript
- Batch scripting
- Blueprint visual scripting
How many revisions do I get per tech art project at Atomhawk?
Most tech art work is highly iterative, and our team is expected to carry out however many passes are required to ensure that a piece of work meets the quality and performance standards set by the client. Software development is generally all about revision and refinement, and communication is kept at a high standard throughout this process.
