Freeman Company is hiring: Creative Technologist in Detroit

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About Us

Sparks is a leading global brand experience agency, specializing in the design and execution of award-winning experiences that forge deep connections between brands and audiences. Recognized by Adweek as Experiential Agency of the Year, we bring a unique blend of strategic insight and execution excellence to every brand activation, corporate event, trade show exhibit, and immersive experience. Our commitment to creativity, innovation, and flawless execution drives us to craft impactful experiential marketing solutions that deepen relationships, inspire action, and build trust—all around the world.

Summary

The Creative Technologist works with design and production teams to produce unique, custom software and hardware-based interactive experiences and exhibits that connect audiences with brands at live events. Our ideal Creative Technologist brings an engineer’s mind and a designer’s mentality together to create engaging and impactful interactive experiences. This role focuses on defining technical requirements, and building solutions for production in close collaboration with the Creative Technology team. We are seeking a self-driven technologist who loves to move fluidly between both creative and technical thinking, is comfortable working on software and hardware development, and strives to realize unique interactive experiences.

Locations

• Philadelphia, PA
• Fort Wayne, IN
• Detroit, MI
• Dallas, TX

Essential Duties & Responsibilities

• Build fully functional, exhibit-grade physical computing activations.
• Support internal fabrication shops to integrate technology into larger structures.
• Work with creatives, fabricators, and external developers to align technical requirements, validate integration, and ensure seamless delivery.
• Participate in shop tests to validate technical functionality; support on-site setup and installation to ensure successful deployment of interactive experiences.
• Participate in internal research and development efforts to explore and prototype new technologies.
• Establish test plans and QA processes to ensure stability, usability, and performance across hardware and software deployments.
• Thoroughly document demos and installations to support future shows and technical maintenance.

Education & Experience Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree Interactive Media, Industrial Design, Computer Science, plus 2-4 years equivalent practical experience
• Strong grasp of low voltage electronics and microcontrollers (Arduino, Raspberry Pi, Lighting, sensors, etc)
• Experience with prototyping and digital fabrication
• Experience with design tools and CAD (e.g. Adobe suite, Solidworks)
• Experience working with design and production teams from across an organization
• Ability to read and create technical drawings, basic wiring diagrams, and system architecture documentation
• Some experience with front end web technologies and real-time graphics frameworks. (e.g. Javascript, Unity, TouchDesigner, p5.js, etc.)
• Familiarity with networking concepts, including OSC, MQTT, WebSockets, UDP/TCP, DMX/Art-Net, etc.
• Excellent written, verbal and interpersonal communication skills
• Comfort working on-site at events and in fabrication shops, sometimes under tight timelines
• Strong problem-solving ability in ambiguous, fast-changing environments

Travel Requirements

Travel up to 25%

What We Offer

Freeman provides benefits that aim to empower our people and their families to thrive mentally, physically, and financially. These are a handful of the types of programs and benefits our full-time people may be eligible for. There may be some variances in specific benefits across regions.

• Medical, Dental, Vision Insurance
• Tuition Reimbursement
• Paid Parental Leave
• Life, Accident and Disability
• Retirement with Company Match
• Paid Time Off

Diversity Commitment

At Freeman, our commitment to diversity and inclusion is helping us to create not only a great place to work, but also an environment where our employees, our customers and our communities around the world can reach their goals and connect with each other. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, veteran status and other characteristics protected by federal, state or local laws.