Job Description

This position will support the Center for Design and Space Architecture (CDSA) team onsite at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. The CDSA is NASA’s human-centered design studio. CDSA leverages expertise in industrial design, architecture, and systems engineering to solve the unique challenges of living and working in extreme environments. The CDSA team develops advanced concepts through the iterative design process and uses an array of digital and physical mediums, including virtual and hybrid reality, to test and refine designs. CDSA designers use VR to gain rapid access to 1:1 scale and 3D interaction with their designs. As one of our VR developers, you will help the designers access and interact with their design concepts in VR. Additionally, CDSA facilitates evaluations and reviews to assess crew interface design, habitability, and layout performance. This includes the use of Virtual Reality (VR) to gather subject matter expert (SME) and crew feedback through Human-in-the-Loop (HITL) testing using astronaut crewmembers. As one of our VR developers, you will help create these virtual testing environments and develop the functionality needed to perform the test objectives. Lastly, we are always evolving our VR capability, and as one of our VR developers, you will help create innovations that enhance or expand our ability to simulate human spaceflight in the virtual environment.

Tasks May Include

• Using Unreal Engine, develop new or enhanced functionality to improve Virtual Reality (VR) simulation of human spaceflight operations
• Using Unreal Engine, develop new functionality to improve Virtual Reality (VR) capability for design, review, and collaboration
• Using Substance Painter to create high quality textures for use in Unreal Engine materials
• Using knowledge of Blender, Substance, and/or Unreal Engine, help the team improve our conversion of CAD models into optimized VR assets

Essential Duties & Responsibilities

• Develop, configure, and test blueprints in Unreal to generate and evolve functionality in VR
• Develop assets for use in virtual/hybrid reality environments
• Review VR project with team leads and/or customers to ensure functional requirements are met
• Troubleshoot and debug blueprint programming/code as necessary
• Support VR testing by training test subjects, queuing interactions or configurations, and troubleshooting technical difficulties real-time
• Participate in regular team meetings to discuss activity and progress

Required

EDUCATION & EXPERIENCE:

The candidate must have extensive experience creating and developing high quality Unreal Engine content. Additionally, the candidate must provide a portfolio and/or prior experience that demonstrates their ability.

Desired

The candidate should have experience creating virtual reality experiences in Unreal Engine. Experience with multiplayer in Unreal Engine is also desired. Experience creating virtual environments for design review and evaluation is also desired. 

The candidate should have a bachelor’s degree in computer science or other technically related area and five years of experience.

Required

SKILLS & TRAINING:

The qualified candidate must have excellent Unreal Engine programming. The ability to work effectively both in small teams and independently is also required. A successful candidate will have excellent interpersonal skills and the ability to work well in a multidisciplinary team. The candidate must be able to handle a variety of work expectations, must be motivated and take initiative, and must be able to work independently after initial training.

Desired

Experienced with Unreal Engine, Blender, Substance Painter and Adobe Creative Suite.

Relocation assistance is available.