Twenty-one workers at 2K Games’ Petaluma, California, motion capture studio filed for a union election on Tuesday, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees announced Wednesday in a news release. The group is looking to the National Labor Relations Board to schedule an election after 2K management failed to respond to a request for voluntary recognition.
Workers at the studio, which is referred to as 2K Mocap, have formed the first public union campaign at a dedicated motion capture studio. They’re looking to address issues with working conditions and pay. “The unit’s priorities include job security, pay equity that reflects industry standards, wage minimums for new hires, and a clearer definition of job responsibilities,” IATSE wrote in a news release. “The workers argue that despite recent investments in upgrading the facility, their wages remain below par, making it difficult to maintain long-term careers in the industry.”
The union, if certified, would cover animators, artists, audio specialists, carpenters, stage technicians, and engineers. These workers do motion capture for franchises like NBA 2K, Mafia, BioShock, WWE 2K, and others. Video game motion capture actors are typically represented by the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. (Video game actors, including motion capture actors, are currently on strike, largely over artificial intelligence protections.) The people who work at 2K Mocap aren’t actors; they do the rest of the work that surrounds the actors: building sets, animating models, capturing motion and audio, and making sure all those little motion capture balls stay on the motion capture suits.
“As creative professionals, we have a tendency to sacrifice and settle for less, because we have an unrelenting passion for what we do and the projects we work on,” 2K Mocap motion capture tools engineer Ryan Kwok said in a statement. “But we owe it to ourselves and to others in this industry to fight for protections so that we can keep building the games that we and so many others love.”
2K Games has not responded to Polygon’s request for comment.
The proposed union is represented by IATSE, which is an international union that represents entertainment workers who are typically behind the scenes. Its focus has largely been the movie and television industries, but IATSE has recently expanded into the video game industry. In 2023, Workinman Interactive, which makes licensed games like Spongebob’s Game Frenzy and Fisher Price: Smart Cycle, unionized with IATSE.
