Unreal Cinematic Pipeline Engineer

Magnopus is looking for an Unreal Cinematic Pipeline Engineer to help build and maintain the tools and workflows that connect Unreal Engine with modern cinematic production pipelines.

As a spatial design and innovation company, we work at the intersection of technology, creativity and emerging experiences. Our teams bring together engineers, artists, designers and producers to create ambitious work for some of the world's leading brands and organisations.

In this role, you'll work closely with artists, production teams and fellow engineers to develop tools, automation and integrations that improve production workflows, reduce manual effort and help teams deliver high-quality cinematic experiences more efficiently.

Rather than focusing on a single product or technology, you'll solve real production challenges across Unreal Engine, pipeline tooling and modern VFX workflows. From building automation and production integrations to improving rendering pipelines and artist tooling, you'll play an important role in helping creative teams work faster, more reliably and with greater confidence.

Contract

This is an initial fixed-term project hire through the end of September 2026, with an anticipated extension through February 2027, subject to project requirements.

Location

This is a hybrid role requiring a minimum of two days per week working from our Downtown Los Angeles office. During key phases of the project, additional time in the office may occasionally be required to support close collaboration with the wider team.

What you'll do

• Design and develop tools that improve artist productivity, reduce iteration time and enhance production quality.
• Develop custom tools, plugins and automation using Python, C++ and Unreal Engine.
• Build and maintain rendering workflows using Movie Render Graph (MRG) and Movie Render Queue (MRQ) to support complex cinematic rendering pipelines.
• Develop and maintain integrations between Unreal Engine and production tracking systems, including ShotGrid (Flow).
• Partner with artists, production teams and technical stakeholders to understand workflow challenges and deliver practical solutions.
• Extend and integrate third-party applications and tools where appropriate.
• Support, troubleshoot and enhance existing pipeline tools and production workflows.
• Produce clear documentation that supports onboarding, knowledge sharing and long-term maintenance.
• Participate in code reviews and contribute to the continued improvement of engineering practices.
• Stay current with developments in Unreal Engine, virtual production and VFX technologies, identifying opportunities to improve our tooling and workflows.

What will help you succeed in this role

• Strong experience developing pipeline tools and automation using Python.
• Experience developing Unreal Engine tooling using C++, Python and the Unreal Engine Editor APIs.
• Strong understanding of Unreal Engine 5, including Sequencer, Movie Render Graph (MRG), Movie Render Queue (MRQ) and related cinematic workflows.
• Experience working with production tracking systems such as ShotGrid (Flow).
• Experience working within modern VFX, virtual production or real-time content pipelines, with an understanding of how tools such as Maya, Houdini and Nuke fit into those workflows.
• Experience using version control systems, including Perforce and Git.
• Strong problem-solving skills and the ability to investigate and resolve complex pipeline issues.
• Excellent communication skills and the ability to collaborate effectively with artists, production teams and engineers.
• A collaborative mindset and a genuine desire to improve production workflows through better tooling and automation.
• Experience working within Linux-based production environments.

Even better if you also have

• Experience developing custom Unreal Engine plugins or extending Unreal Engine functionality.
• Experience building user interfaces for internal tools using frameworks such as PyQt.
• Experience with cloud rendering, CI/CD pipelines or REST APIs.
• Familiarity with colour management, camera tracking, lens calibration and other modern cinematic or virtual production workflows.
• Experience using media processing tools such as FFmpeg.
• Deep working knowledge of Perforce (Helix Core) in large-scale production environments, including complex stream structures, branch/merge workflows and cross-studio collaboration.
• Understanding of production and delivery codecs such as ProRes, H.264, HEVC, AV1 and VP9.

We don't expect anyone to tick every box

If you're excited by the opportunity to build tools that help artists and engineers create world-class cinematic experiences, and believe you could be successful in the role, we'd love to hear from you.