Blender Lighting & Environment Artist

ONYX RENDERS is looking for a skilled Blender artist to join us on an ongoing basis. There is recurring work every month. Before we offer a long-term position, we'll start with a paid pilot project so both sides can see whether the fit is right.
The work
You'll build large, photorealistic interior spaces that are viewed from every direction, at different heights and distances. Every wall, corner and surface has to hold up, and nothing can be set up for only one good camera angle. Once the lighting is final, you'll bake it into lightmaps for an external GPU rendering pipeline. You deliver clean production files only, with no interactive build or viewer.
What we care about most: realism
Our standard for lighting and photorealism is very high, and anything that looks "CG" will not pass. We're looking for:
Natural, physically believable lighting that comes from real, visible light sources, with balanced exposure and no clipped highlights
High-resolution scanned or photo-based PBR materials at true real-world scale
Real-life imperfections throughout the space: subtle wear, scuffs, faint stains, dust in corners, and objects that aren't perfectly aligned. The space should feel used, not freshly generated.
Quality built into the materials and lighting. No AI enhancement or upscaling on final outputs.
Technical requirements
Advanced Blender skills with Cycles, and hands-on experience baking lighting
A clean second UV channel (UV1) for lightmaps, with no overlapping islands and sensible texel density that is highest on surfaces seen up close
Lightmaps exported as linear EXR (16/32-bit, with no tone mapping or colour transforms)
FBX (or glTF) export at real-world scale in metres, with both UV channels and full PBR texture sets, especially roughness maps
A well-organised, editable .blend file with all materials, lights and textures included
All assets either modelled by you or sourced with commercial licences, plus a documented licence list
Nice to have
Photogrammetry or photo-to-PBR material workflows
Experience preparing assets for custom or real-time render pipelines
How it works
Shortlist: We review portfolios and select a small number of artists.
Kickoff meeting: Before any scene work begins, we hold a video call to walk through the brief and references, agree on the technical setup and quality standard, and confirm the timeline.
Paid pilot: You complete one full environment, baked version included. Payment is milestone-based and released once each stage of the deliverables is reviewed and approved.
Long-term collaboration: If the pilot meets the standard, we move to a steady monthly workflow.
What we offer
A paid pilot, with the fee, milestones and timeline agreed in writing at the kickoff meeting
Consistent monthly volume for the right artist
Remote, flexible work
A collaborative team that welcomes your ideas on materials, lighting and layout
How to apply
When applying, please include:
Your portfolio, especially interior work rendered in Blender Cycles
A baked-lighting example (FBX/glTF + EXR lightmaps + a UV1 layout screenshot), or a short breakdown of a past bake
Your expected turnaround for one complete, fully baked interior environment
Your availability for a kickoff call this week
We want to finalise this hire within the next 1–2 days, so please get in touch soon.

Work arrangement
Yes