Start with the game engine’s joint limit — typically 75-100 joints for a hero character. Place joints to serve the primary deformations the animator will need, not to replicate real anatomy. Spine joints, shoulder gimbal helpers, twist joints — these serve animation first. Name everything to the studio convention from the start. Hierarchy changes mid-production are expensive; get the joint placement right before skinning.

Describe your twist joint setup — typically three joints distributing the twist along the forearm length. Show you understand the relationship between the wrist and elbow rotations and how you isolate the twist axis. Cover your corrective blend shape approach for poses the joint setup cannot solve. The answer matters less than demonstrating systematic problem-solving rather than trial and error.

Cover your combination approach: joint-based for primary deformations driven by SHAPES or blend shapes, corrective shapes for poses that joints alone cannot handle. Describe your control system — how animators drive the face and what UI makes that accessible. Mention how you handle asymmetry, corrective shapes firing order, and the handoff process to animation. Facial rigs at this level require both technical and aesthetic judgment.

Describe the clavicle-to-upper-arm weight distribution, the twist joint contribution, and how you isolate the scapula movement. This is one of the most tested deformation problems in rigging interviews. Studios want to know you understand the anatomy of the problem — the scapula needs to rotate with arm raise — and have a practical solution that works within the joint budget.

Walk through the problem, why a script was the right solution, and what the tool does. Be specific about what it automates — mirror weights, rebuild rig from a template, batch export joints to a naming convention. Studios value rigging artists who reduce repetitive work for themselves and the team. Even a simple tool that saves 30 minutes per character across 50 characters is significant.

Cover your IK/FK chain setup, the switch attribute, and how you handle the snap-to-match requirement animators need for clean switches between modes. Animators need the hands to stay in space when they switch. Describe how you implement that — world space matching on switch. The technical implementation matters, but what matters more is that you have thought about what makes the system actually usable.

Correctives are for poses that joints simply cannot produce correctly — extreme fleshy areas, specific cloth behavior, muscles that need to fire in non-linear ways. If the problem is that your skin weights are wrong, fix the weights. If the problem is that the geometry needs to change shape based on a pose, use a corrective. The test: if you fixed the weighting perfectly, would the deformation still be wrong? If yes, you need a corrective.

Cover your approach: secondary joint chains driven by a combination of FK follow-through and dynamic bones or spring systems. Describe how you set stiffness and dampening values to read naturally at different animation speeds. Studios want solutions that are responsive without looking floaty, and that an animator can override when they need specific control. Simulation is ideal but not always within performance budget.

Cover the FBX export workflow, which deformers bake correctly and which do not, and how you handle blend shapes versus joint-based deformation in the target engine. Custom deformers typically need to be rebuilt in engine. Joint-based deformation transfers cleanly. Describe how you test that the export matches the DCC result and what tolerance you accept for deformation differences.

Assess the impact first. Understand which animations are already using the rig and whether the change will break them. Communicate the cost to the lead and producer before starting. If possible, build the change on a new version rather than modifying the live rig. Test with animation first before deploying to the full team. A rig change that breaks 40 shots is far more expensive than the time saved by the fix.

Animate-driven feedback is usually right — if an animator says a control is in the wrong place or a rotation axis feels wrong, it is probably wrong. The line is around technical constraints: joint limits, engine export requirements, or performance budgets that cannot be moved. Document the constraints early so animators know what is fixed versus what can be changed. The best rig reviews are conversations, not presentations.

Specific answers only — a conference talk, a specific technique you learned from another artist, a new Control Rig feature in Unreal. Studios want to hire people who are actively improving, not people who are done learning. The best answer describes something you implemented from what you learned, not just something you watched.

Maya is the standard DCC for rigging in most game studios. Blender rigging is accepted at indie studios. Houdini is increasingly used for procedural rig systems at larger studios. Engine-side rigging uses Unreal Control Rig or Unity’s Avatar system. Specialized tools like Maya SHAPES or Wrap4D appear in studios with heavy facial work. Perforce is the standard version control.

Rigging artist salaries range from $60K-$90K at mid-level to $90K-$140K+ at senior level in AAA studios. Rigging TDs with programming skills (Python, MEL) command the higher end. Facial rigging specialists at major studios working on photorealistic characters can earn $120K-$160K+. London and Vancouver rates are competitive in GBP and CAD respectively.

A rigger builds and maintains rigs following established conventions and studio pipelines. A rigging TD (technical director) builds the tools, automation systems, and pipelines that riggers use. TDs write Python scripts for rig automation, develop custom deformers, and solve technical pipeline problems. At smaller studios the same person does both. At AAA studios, they are separate roles with different seniority expectations.

Python is expected at most studios. You should be able to write rig automation scripts, build UI tools for animators, and read and modify existing pipeline code. MEL knowledge is helpful for Maya-specific work. C++ is not required for most rigging roles but is a significant advantage at studios building custom rig engines or integrating with proprietary systems. The more automation you can write, the more valuable you are.

Show rigs in motion with animation driving them — a static T-pose screenshot tells a reviewer nothing. Include a facial rig demo with range of expressions and corrective shapes firing correctly. Show a body rig with squash and stretch, volume preservation, and twist distribution. If you have Python tools, show the UI and explain what problem they solve. Breakdown videos that explain your hierarchy and deformation decisions are highly valued.