LIVE SERVICES ART LEAD

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OVERVIEW

In the middle of the Madden NFL 21 seasonal cycle, I beganeserved as the Art Lead for the Live Service department, overseeing a team of 10 artists—six dedicated to Madden Ultimate Team and four focused on Messaging. I played a key role in shaping the visual themes and styles of over 200 programs, which were well-received both by our fans and within our team.

My time as the Lead was one of the most meaningful years of my career, as my responsibilities extended beyond delivering high-quality visuals to also fostering the career growth and well-being of my team. Mentoring 10 artists and supporting their development, success, and mental health became my top priority. By fully investing in them, I helped create a culture of mutual support and growth—an aspect of leadership I deeply value.

Beyond leading day-to-day creative efforts, I developed concepts for future programs, some of which remain active today, including AKA and the Heritage series—Hispanic Heritage and AANHPI Heritage—which I initially pitched during the Madden NFL 21 cycle. Additionally, I collaborated with the marketing team to bring in an external artist for the Black History Month program, ultimately selecting a student from FAMU to create the artwork for Madden NFL 23’s BHM initiative.

For my efforts, I was recognized with a Sharkie award for Outstanding Achievement in Art, highlighting my contributions as the team’s lead, promoting a culture of collaboration, accountability, and encouragement, resulting in a high-performing art team. The Sharkie is an award, unique to EA Tiburon, meant to recognize deserving members for their contributions as voted on by members of the studio.

- Determined the visual and thematic direction for Madden Ultimate Team’s seasonal programs, reaching a final delivery of over 210 programs across three years
- Oversaw the delivery, of art assets for all programs, provided critical feedback, and ensured all needs from content producers were met to keep the quality of our products consistent.
- Managed a team of 10 artists, overseeing their career development, skill growth, and project contributions, in which we created a supportive team environment.
- Prioritizing coaching and mentorship for all team members of varying career experiences.
- Worked with development managers and producers to schedule content releases, artist contributions and estimates.
- Worked with multiple first-party partners to create assets based on their IPs, and keeping a healthy relationship between all parties.
- Collaborated closely with the art team to brainstorm the visual direction of all programs releasing during the Madden NFL 23 cycle.
- Refined and presented the final visual direction to stakeholders, and senior leadership with our motion graphics partner to provide art direction for all of our item animations.
- Operated as the direct point of contact and direction with our motion graphics partners for the upcoming M23 program animations.
- Partnered with the Content team to identify the deliverables for each program, identify risks, and determine the delivery dates of all assets to ensure proper testing could be achieved.
- Coordinated multi-disciplinary teams and external partners to improve communication, identify art dependencies, and align delivery timelines, ensuring any teams depending on our artists were able to complete their project milestones.
- Helped our content designers and producers prioritize content expectations and deliverables so our artists are putting their efforts in the right places, and keep our delivery dates honest.
- Responsible for managing JIRA tasks for the art team, and gathering necessary information from producers and designers regarding their designs to set them up for discuss.
- Increased our output by improving several of our existing processes which helped to lessen artist’s expected overtime hours.
- Responsible for our hiring and interviewing process for new Live Service artists, and served as an additional interviewer for Live Service content designers.