Principal Rendering Engineer

Climax Studios

Principal Rendering Engineer in a co-development studio enhancing rendering technology for AAA games and real-time simulation. Collaborate on low-level engine code against major graphics APIs.

Posted 6/15/2026full-timeRemote • 🇬🇧 United KingdomLeadWebsite

Tech Stack

Tools & technologies

RayUnreal Engine

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Turn the art team’s vision into shippable, scalable rendering technology
Design, build and maintain high-performance rendering backends with clean abstractions across PC, console and Mac
Profile and resolve deep GPU/CPU bottlenecks: occupancy, tile memory pressure, indirect dispatch overhead, bandwidth
Modernize pipelines with GPU-driven culling, indirect command buffers and bindless architectures
Design concurrent GPU memory management on modern API features and memory heaps
Extend major engines (including Unreal source) and custom C++ architectures
The opportunity to represent the studio externally through white papers or presenting at industry events

Requirements

What you’ll need

An established track record in rendering or engine engineering, shipping high-performance rendering systems for AAA, film/VFX, XR or simulation across a number of products
Deep experience with modern C++ and solid shader authoring and debugging (HLSL, MSL or GLSL)
Production experience shipping with at least two of Metal, DirectX 12, Vulkan or GNM/GNMX
Deep working knowledge of the full pipeline: rasterization, compute and hardware-accelerated ray tracing
Fluency in modern rendering techniques: PBR, GI, ambient occlusion, volumetrics, and post-processing (AA, HDR, tone mapping, motion blur), with awareness of current GPU-driven pipelines, meshlet rendering, and real-time path tracing workflows
Comfortable dropping into unfamiliar codebases and making sound architectural calls independently
Solid applied 3D maths, plus technical writing other engineers actually want to read.
Bonus Points
Practical experience with mesh shading pipelines (DX12, Vulkan, Metal) to optimize geometry processing and reduce CPU overhead
Familiarity with modern hardware variations, including console and Apple Silicon unified memory architectures
Shipped ray tracing or heavily compute-driven rendering
Extensive Unreal Engine source modifications.

Benefits

Comp & perks

Flexible working: Remote-friendly long before it was the norm, with core hours that support both great work and real life.
Support & wellbeing: Mental health first-aiders, therapy and coaching via Myndup, plus private medical insurance to help you stay healthy and supported.
Pension & life cover: A strong pension plan and life insurance to support your future and protect your family.
Time for you: Minimum 25 days’ holiday, a paid winter break, and 3 volunteering days each year to give back to causes you care about.
Parental leave: Family-first policies that support parents and caregivers with flexibility and balance.
Levelling up: Annual L&D budget, expert talks, game jams, and mentoring opportunities to help you grow your skills and career.

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills & Tools

C++HLSLMSLGLSLMetalDirectX 12VulkanGPU memory managementray tracing3D mathematics

Soft Skills

technical writingindependent decision makingproblem solving