Art Director @ Buddy.ai
Buddy.ai is looking for an Art Director to develop a captivating and distinct visual style for our AI tutor and to lead the art team that will implement and perfect it.
Buddy.ai, the world’s first AI tutor for kids under 12
Buddy.ai provides affordable, high-quality 1X1 instruction to children worldwide using our interactive, voice-based character Buddy the Robot.
Buddy is powered by proprietary AI technology for children and features a unique UX and gameplay. He teaches kids using voice- and tap-based games in a fun-filled world created by educational experts.
With 20 million downloads last year alone, Buddy is the most popular language app for children on Google Play and one of TIME Magazine’s World's Top EdTech Rising Stars of 2024. We are backed by top VCs and angel investors, including stars of the game industry, deep tech, and Hollywood.
Here’s a short video about Buddy.ai - https://youtu.be/VooWuYR7hY0
Your Mission
You will create and refine a distinct and appealing art style that will attract children ages 4-12 to Buddy.ai’s game world. We want a look and feel that can compete with the top mobile games for kids and position Buddy as a strong IP that will become part of global pop culture.
Objectives & Outcomes
- Develop and refine Buddy.ai’s art style in two years.
- Implement this new style to help game designers and developers create a metagame and multiple educational mini-games that utilize Buddy.ai's rich game world.
- Build Buddy.ai’s art team from the ground up and/or work with external contractors to achieve your objectives and fulfill your mission.
- Help our Creative Producer and Social Media Marketers refine the style of Buddy.ai’s video content for YouTube channels and other platforms.
- Support our Marketing team’s brand-building efforts and ensure consistent communications.
Competencies
- Art leadership experience in mobile or console games: 5+ years of experience in the industry. Understands both the art and technical aspects of the craft. Has hands-on experience in designing, delivering, and perfecting live and successful mobile or console games/mobile apps with thousands of players.
- Relevant experience with children: A background in designing games for children under 12 professionally; a previous role as a teacher; or kids of your own between the ages of 3-10.
- Creative/innovative approach: The ability and willingness to create new innovative designs rather than copying and reskinning existing ones.
- Expertise in 3D design and a clear understanding of production pipelines. Ideally, hands-on experience with Unity 3D.
- Experience developing a visual style for games from scratch.
- Thrives within constraints: Seeks to understand the limiting factors, including technical and financial constraints, as well as the brand’s legacy, and work with them.
- User/player-centric approach: Strives to understand and satisfy players' needs. Actively seeks user feedback.
- Efficiency with a startup mindset: Achieves goals with minimal resources. Prototypes fast, ships MVPs. Fails fast and moves on.
- Proactive and autonomous: Takes initiative, proposes solutions and acts without hesitation. Does not wait for detailed instructions or specifications to act and is open to shifting gears based on feedback. Follows through on commitments. Ships products. Ensures problems are solved completely.
- High standards and ambitions: A genuine hunger to succeed, ship the world’s top product, work with A-players, and learn from the best.
- Team player: Values and pursues collaboration. Actively seeks feedback from peers and provides support if needed. Listens to stakeholders.
Gameplay (what exactly Buddy.ai’s Art Director will do)
- You’ll be the first and only person on Buddy’s art team to start. Your work will include:
- Building an internal art team from scratch. This means you will serve as “hiring manager” and personally pick everyone you need.
- Alternatively, if you find it more efficient, you can complete the work using external contractors — individuals or art outsourcing agencies. In that case, you will have to find, contract, and organize the work of all your contractors.
- You will be tasked with finding and/or refining the unique art style of the Buddy.ai game and wider IP. You are free to work with external advisors and experts on this task. We will provide you with access to a wide network of game industry and Hollywood contacts we have made through our investors.
- You will create the style, look, and feel of a unique platform built around our talking interactive AI character – Buddy the Robot. Buddy is the centerpiece of our business because children love him. Much of your work will be focused on making Buddy even cooler and more lovable.
- Buddy is the first product of its kind, so we innovate, brainstorm, prototype, playtest on children in a lab, and AB test using real users.
- You will work directly with our engineering team, as well as game designers and product managers, to ship new features to our users – Buddy.ai’s students and players. During the first year on the job, you will report directly to the CEO.
- We expect you to interact with our Marketing and Buddy the AI Influencer teams (who run Buddy’s Youtube channels) to help them optimize their performance and ensure consistency or the style across all communications.
- You will be a crucial member of our team from Day One. We need to ship multiple new features in 9 months and almost completely rework the product within two years. Your work is essential to achieving our goals. The learning curve will be steep, but the ride will be thrilling!
Geography and languages
The ideal candidate will live between the Eastern Time Zone (New York, U.S.) in the West and GMT+3 (Istanbul) in the East because most of our developers and designers are based in the Central European Time Zone. We are not hiring in Russia unless the candidate is ready to relocate within six months of starting the job. The Company is happy to help with relocation.
We speak English and Russian (many of our engineers are from former Soviet Union countries.)
Ready for the best job in the world?
- Unique product: At Buddy.ai, we are pioneering the Multimodal AI Tutoring approach, which means our tutor is a virtual character that uses voice recognition and conversational AI to teach children. Buddy is the first product of its kind, so we innovate, brainstorm, prototype, playtest on children in a lab, and AB test using real users.
- The leading consumer AI company in the early learning space: We have millions of users, and that number doubles year after year. Buddy is not another Chat GPT wrapper; we are developing proprietary AT technology for children - safe, fast, and compliant with COPPA and other regulations.
- Mission-driven project: Our mission is inspired by our team’s experiences as immigrants and parents and those of our children.
- Impact and love: It’s great knowing that you are building an educational product that helps children thrive. You can always draw inspiration and satisfaction from the love of Buddy’s users.
- Perfect job for Moms and Dads: Many (or most) of our team members are parents. We draw inspiration from our children's experiences with Buddy.ai. It is a special feeling when your child admiringly asks, “Mom, did you really create Buddy?”
- Friendly, open, and informal work environment: Our small (but growing) team is horizontally structured. All product and financial metrics are openly discussed because we work collaboratively and share everything. No politics, no BS — we work hard and have a lot of fun in the process.
- High-level position with significant creative freedom: You’ll report directly to the CEO, which means you’ll have lots of decision-making authority. Your ideas and decisions will affect the whole company and millions of our students/players worldwide.
- Team-building opportunity: You’ll get the chance to assemble a team according to the project's needs. Your focus will be on the Company’s product, business, and mission, with no unnecessary layers of decision-making.
- Contribution and growth: A small team means the opportunity for a large individual contribution. The Company is growing fast, which allows team members to grow with it while creating a lasting legacy.
- 100% Remote work with a flexible schedule/Paid sick leave and vacation days.
- A share of our success: This key role grants a Stock Option because when we win, we win together.
