Contract 2D Character Animator — Napoli mascot

Napoli is our octopus mascot and AI assistant, living inside the product UI. He exists as vector (SVG) and PNG artwork plus a set of short expression clips. Finapolis owns the character design and all existing artwork outright — you would be animating our IP, not creating a character from scratch.

We are looking for one animator to own Napoli on an ongoing basis — learn the character, build and hold the rig, and produce new poses, expressions and interface states as the product grows. The rig you build gets reused for years, so it is worth building well.

Work arrives in small batches rather than one large handoff. Hours average about five a week over a month, weighted toward the start while the rig and the first project are built.

We are making Napoli an active part of the interface: he holds and presents 1–6 clickable items on his tentacles, and occasionally points one out. The item count changes at runtime.

Items arrive two ways — either already held when Napoli appears, or picked up: he reaches to a panel at the side of the screen, takes an item from it, and brings it forward to hold. Both need to read naturally.

You would deliver the tentacle choreography, the holding poses, the point-out treatment, and the transition clips.

The full creative spec (slot arrangement, anchor metadata, and file conventions) lives in a separate brief, shared before you quote.

After this, expect new expressions, new interface states, and seasonal or campaign variants — all off the same rig.

An octopus arm is a muscular hydrostat — no joints, continuous curvature along its whole length, and it thins as it extends, thickens as it contracts. Napoli's tentacles must read that way.

We are asking for a curve/deformer-based rig, not a short bone chain. The architecture we want: a few driver controls shape a spline, and the artwork deforms continuously along it. In Moho this is the Curver / Compressible Curver layer; in Harmony, the Curve Deformer paired with a Deformation-Scale node for width. A 4–6 bone FK chain per tentacle is not acceptable — it reads hinged, and it is the most common way this job is done wrong.

Three acceptance criteria, each judged separately:

• Continuous curvature — no visible kinks or segment joints anywhere along the arm.
• Variable thickness — animated line width along the length, thinning on extension. This is the criterion most often skipped. Tell us explicitly how you will achieve it in your tool.
• Curl and grip — the tentacle wraps and holds an object, not just sways.

Automatic follow-through (Moho Bone Dynamics, Harmony Dynamic Spring) is welcome for secondary motion, but the primary curl must be art-directed, not left to simulation.

• Moho Pro 14 (preferred) — Curvers with animatable per-point Line Width; imports our SVG with gradients and masks intact.
• Toon Boom Harmony Premium — Curve Deformer plus Deformation-Scale node; Curve deformers are Premium-tier only.
• Other — considered if you can demonstrate all three criteria above and match the existing artwork exactly.

Whatever you use, the character must remain visually identical to the existing Napoli. We are not looking for a 3D-rendered or re-drawn interpretation.

Before the ongoing arrangement starts we commission one short clip, paid at your hourly rate:

The brief: Napoli, from neutral, reaches out with one tentacle to a tray/panel at the left of frame, grabs a tab from it, brings it in front of him, and holds it. Transparent background.

We supply the Napoli SVG — one neutral pose is all you need; rig and animate from that. Use a simple placeholder rectangle for the tab and the tray; we are judging the tentacle, not the props.

Judged on the three criteria above, with particular attention to the reach-and-grip. If it passes, we proceed to the first project and the ongoing contract.

Remote and async. Concept round before finals, questions early, scope changes flagged.

Responsiveness. Small requests acknowledged within a business day and typically turned around inside a week. We are not asking you to be on call — just reachable and predictable.

Consistency is the standard. Every new pose must match the existing Napoli exactly. Full technical requirements, deliverable formats and file conventions are in the separate creative brief.

• Work-for-hire. Full ownership and rights transfer to Finapolis, including all source and rig files.
• No third-party stock or AI-generated assets embedded without disclosure and clearance.
• Hourly, rate negotiable. Hours logged and invoiced monthly; we agree an estimate before each batch of work so there are no surprises on either side.