Senior Motion Designer / Motion Director (Contract)

We're a small, taste-driven team at a seed-stage startup heading into launch, and we're hiring someone who can own video end-to-end on a contract basis. Not just animate — concept, storyboard, references, animatic, polish, ship.

About guide:human

guide:human is a social curation platform — a place to share and discover recommendations through trusted connections. We're heading into a coordinated launch with a small core team and care a lot about taste.

What this role actually is

We've been calling this "motion design" and it's been the wrong title. The work is closer to a motion director or video producer. Specifically, someone who:

• Takes a brief like "explain this feature in 30 seconds" and runs the conversation back at us — emotional beat, viewer, reference language.
• Owns the storyboard. Co-builds frames, asks for the right product screens, copy, and assets.
• Knows references cold. You pull the right one for the right scene faster than we can.
• Builds the animatic before the polish, so we align on rhythm without burning days on rounds.
• Hands off properly to engineering for in-app motion — speed curves, Bézier values, Lottie, timings.
• Has the taste of an art director and the tools of a senior motion designer.

Some of this is instructional ("here's how this works"), some is emotional ("this feels magical"). A strong candidate adjusts the format.

What you'll work on

• In-product tutorials and feature intros shipped inside the iOS app
• Brand and marketing video — social cuts, App Store promo, launch content
• Motion handoff specs for engineering when motion ships inside the product
• A working motion language for the guide:human brand

What we're looking for

Craft

• Senior-level After Effects. Cavalry, C4D, or equivalent is a plus.
• Strong storyboarding and animatic skills.
• Editorial sensibility for type, pacing, and information density.
• Bonus: video editing, sound instinct, App Store promo, Lottie/iOS handoff.

Mindset

• You're a producer, not just a maker. You run the process.
• You care about why before how.
• You ask for help — asset, walkthrough — without waiting to be told.
• Comfortable async, with clear written communication.

Logistics

• Engagement: Contract, project-based — no fixed hours/week. Flex up if things click. Lots of work coming if it does, long-term partnership on the table.
• Rate: Share your hourly rate and reasoning. We care about total cost and outcome more than hourly number, so don't filter yourself out.
• Location: Remote. Americas or Europe — Latin America great. Asia won't work for our hours.
• Timezone: Mostly Eastern-time and European hours with some Pacific-time collaborators. A few hours of overlap with Europe is the working assumption.
• Start: ASAP

Hiring process

1. Reel / portfolio review
2. Intro call
3. Short paid thinking exercise — not finished work, just a window into how you think through story, references, and motion direction
4. Follow-up on collaboration, scope, and availability

How to apply

Send:

1. Your reel — or 2–3 specific projects with a note on what you owned vs. what was handed to you
2. One motion reference you love and one you can't stand, and why
3. Your hourly rate
4. An honest read on your current client load and capacity

Bonus: include one example where you took a messy or unclear concept and turned it into a stronger final video.

Strong applications get a response within 48 hours.