AI & Creative Technology Engineer

Role Description/Overview: 

Yaqeen Institute is seeking a technically skilled and creatively ambitious AI & Creative Technology Engineer to help advance how impactful media is imagined, produced, and delivered. Working at the intersection of filmmaking, software engineering, and emerging artificial intelligence, this role will design and build tools that empower our producers, editors, animators, designers, and researchers to create exceptional content with greater efficiency, consistency, and creative possibility.

This role is ideal for a hands-on builder who can move from experimentation to implementation: someone who can prototype AI-assisted visual storytelling, develop custom applications and automations, and integrate new capabilities into everyday production. The right candidate understands that technology should strengthen human creativity, scholarly accuracy, and artistic judgment — never replace them. A strong parallel is the creative technology and production engineering work emerging within leading film studios and AI-native media teams, adapted to Yaqeen's distinctive mission and standards.

What you'll do

Role & Responsibilities:

• Creative Technology Research & Development: Explore, test, and assess emerging AI tools and creative technologies across video, animation, image, audio, editing, and interactive storytelling. Identify use cases that offer genuine creative or production value.
• AI-Assisted Visual Production: Develop practical workflows for storyboarding, previsualization, historical environments, animation, motion graphics, visual effects, and other media assets in collaboration with the creative team.
• Custom Tool & Application Development: Build lightweight internal applications, scripts, plugins, dashboards, and API integrations that address production bottlenecks and make useful AI capabilities accessible to nontechnical teammates.
• Production Workflow Automation: Improve repetitive tasks such as footage logging, transcription, captioning, media organization, versioning, asset retrieval, localization preparation, and delivery while maintaining human review where needed.
• Pipeline Design & Integration: Connect AI services and custom tools with established creative software and production systems. Build workflows that are reliable, documented, cost-conscious, and practical for real deadlines.
• Creative Collaboration & Prototyping: Partner directly with producers, editors, animators, and designers to translate a creative need into a technical solution; iterate on prototypes until they meet the team's artistic and operational standards.
• Quality, Accuracy & Responsible AI: Establish safeguards for factual reliability, sensitive religious and historical depictions, copyright, privacy, synthetic media, and content provenance. Ensure appropriate editorial and scholarly review before publication.
• Documentation & Team Enablement: Create clear instructions, reusable templates, and workflow guides; train colleagues to use deployed tools confidently and support their adoption over time.
• Performance & Continuous Improvement: Evaluate solutions using measurable indicators such as production time saved, cost, output consistency, reliability, and creative quality. Recommend when an AI solution should — or should not — be used.

Qualifications/Required Skills:

• Proven experience in creative technology, software development, technical artistry, media-pipeline engineering, or workflow automation; a strong portfolio may substitute for a conventional career path.
• Ability to build and maintain working tools using Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, or comparable languages, including integrations with APIs, webhooks, and third-party services.
• Hands-on experience with generative AI tools and models for at least two of the following: video, images, audio, animation, language, or visual effects; an ability to evaluate limitations as well as strengths.
• Familiarity with professional media workflows and creative software such as Adobe Premiere Pro, After Effects, DaVinci Resolve, Photoshop, or comparable tools.
• Comfortable prototyping user-friendly internal applications, managing structured data, troubleshooting technical issues, and working with version control.
• Strong visual judgment and an appreciation for storytelling, composition, motion, consistency, and production quality.
• Ability to make prototypes dependable through testing, error handling, documentation, cost awareness, and attention to data security.
• Excellent communication and collaboration skills, especially when translating technical concepts for creative teammates in a remote environment.
• A strong passion for Yaqeen's mission and a commitment to editorial integrity, scholarly rigor, and thoughtful use of emerging technology.
• Experience with node-based AI workflows (e.g., ComfyUI), VFX/3D pipelines, model customization, media asset management, analytics, or cloud deployment is a strong plus.

Application Assignment:

• Part 1 — Portfolio: Share 2–3 examples of tools, automations, creative AI workflows, or production-facing projects you have built. Briefly describe the problem, your contribution, and the outcome for each example. Links, short screen recordings, or case studies are welcome.
• Part 2 — Yaqeen Workflow Proposal: Select an existing Yaqeen video or series and identify one specific opportunity where AI or creative technology could meaningfully improve storytelling, production quality, or team efficiency.

In 1–2 pages, explain the existing challenge, the solution you would build, the tools or technical approach you would use, how you would protect quality and accuracy, and how you would measure success.

A simple diagram or mockup is welcome; a working prototype is optional, not required. Do not use confidential materials or paid subscriptions for this exercise.

Yaqeen Institute embraces a philosophy that values and promotes diversity. Our goal is to attract, develop, retain, and advance a talented and diverse workforce within a culture where all employees are empowered to reach their fullest potential.

Please note that all career opportunities at Yaqeen Institute are subject to a three-month probationary period, during which we assess performance, alignment with our values, and mutual fit to ensure long-term success in the role.