Machine Learning Engineer (Egocentric 3D Human Pose)

Santa Clara, CA, US Mid Level AI/ML Engineer

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Skills & Technologies

PythonPytorchTensorflowTransformers

About This Role

AI job market dashboard showing open roles by category

### Job Description:

We are looking for a Machine Learning Engineer to join our core research and development team, focused on recovering accurate 3D human body and hand motion from egocentric (first\-person) video.

Human demonstration data is the fuel for robot learning, and the quality of that data is bounded by how well we can reconstruct what the hands and body actually did. In this role, you will own models and pipelines that turn head\-mounted and body\-mounted camera streams — often wide\-FOV, stereo, motion\-blurred, and heavily self\-occluded — into metrically accurate, temporally stable 3D pose that is directly usable for robot policy training and human\-to\-robot retargeting.

You will work across the full stack: capture rig and calibration, ground\-truth annotation tooling, model training and evaluation, and production deployment at scale. This role suits engineers who are equally comfortable with multi\-view geometry and modern deep learning, and who are motivated by hard, measurable accuracy problems on real\-world data.

Responsibilities

====================

  • Build 3D body and hand pose estimation models for egocentric video, covering 2D/3D keypoints, parametric body and hand models (SMPL/SMPL\-X, MANO), and full\-sequence motion recovery from monocular and stereo first\-person cameras.
  • Solve the hard cases specific to the egocentric viewpoint — severe self\-occlusion, truncated limbs, extreme perspective foreshortening, hand–object interaction, rapid head motion, and rolling\-shutter and motion\-blur artifacts.
  • Own camera geometry and calibration: fisheye and wide\-FOV camera models (Kannala\-Brandt, Double Sphere), intrinsic/extrinsic calibration, stereo triangulation, and head\-to\-body coordinate\-frame alignment for metric\-scale output.
  • Drive temporal consistency and physical plausibility through robust estimation, smoothing and filtering, kinematic and anatomical constraints, contact and penetration reasoning, and multi\-view or multi\-modal fusion (e.g. IMU, exocentric cameras, marker\-based mocap).
  • Build the ground\-truth and evaluation loop: semi\-automatic annotation and keypoint propagation tools, confidence\-aware quality gating, and evaluation protocols that separate real accuracy gains from benchmark noise.
  • Ship end\-to\-end systems at scale — large\-scale training, high\-throughput video inference, and reliable production pipelines over high\-bandwidth multi\-camera data.
  • Translate reconstructed human motion into robot\-usable data, collaborating with robotics and product teams on retargeting fidelity for dexterous hands and humanoid end\-effectors.
  • Contribute to technical design, code quality, and best practices, and help shape the long\-term direction of the company’s perception stack.

Minimum Qualifications

==========================

  • Bachelor’s, Master’s, or PhD in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Computer Vision, Robotics, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.
  • 3\+ years of experience building and shipping machine learning systems.
  • Proven hands\-on experience developing and deploying 3D human pose, hand pose, or human motion tracking models from video.
  • Working knowledge of multi\-view geometry and camera models: projection, calibration, triangulation, rigid\-body transforms, and coordinate\-frame management.
  • Strong proficiency in Python and at least one major deep learning framework (e.g. PyTorch, TensorFlow).
  • Solid understanding of modern deep learning concepts, training workflows, model evaluation, and real\-world, production\-oriented ML pipelines.
  • Strong problem\-solving skills and the ability to work effectively in a fast\-moving, collaborative environment.

Preferred Qualifications

============================

  • Direct experience with egocentric or head\-mounted perception (AR/VR headsets, smart glasses, chest\- or head\-mounted capture rigs), including fisheye and stereo pipelines.
  • Deep expertise in human kinematics and parametric models — SMPL/SMPL\-X, MANO, inverse kinematics, markerless motion capture, and hand–object pose estimation.
  • Familiarity with relevant egocentric vision datasets and benchmarks.
  • Familiarity with state\-of\-the\-art architectures for video and 3D data (e.g. video transformers, diffusion\-based motion priors, 3D CNNs, etc).
  • Experience building or operating multi\-camera capture systems, time synchronization, and calibration infrastructure.
  • Experience with human\-to\-robot motion retargeting, teleoperation data, or imitation learning pipelines.
  • Experience with annotation tooling, active learning, or data quality systems for large\-scale video.
  • Publications at leading venues (CVPR, ICCV, ECCV, NeurIPS, SIGGRAPH, 3DV), open\-source contributions, or demonstrated impact in applied ML or AI systems.

What We Offer

=================

  • Competitive salary and options package.
  • Comprehensive health, dental, and vision insurance.
  • 401(k) plan.
  • Paid time off.
  • Direct collaboration with leading experts in the field of robotics and AI.

*MaxInsights is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.*

Default Benefits:

=====================

  • Health insurance
  • Vision care
  • Dental coverage
  • 401(k)
  • Paid holidays
  • PTO (Paid Time Off)
  • Sick leave

Role Details

Company MaxInsights
Title Machine Learning Engineer (Egocentric 3D Human Pose)
Location Santa Clara, CA, US
Category AI/ML Engineer
Experience Mid Level
Salary Not disclosed
Remote No

About This Role

AI/ML Engineers build and deploy machine learning models in production. They work across the full ML lifecycle: data pipelines, model training, evaluation, and serving infrastructure. The role has evolved significantly over the past two years. Where ML Engineers once spent most of their time on model architecture, the job now tilts heavily toward inference optimization, cost management, and integrating LLM capabilities into existing systems. Companies want engineers who can ship production systems, and the experimenter-only role is fading fast.

Day-to-day, you're writing training pipelines, debugging data quality issues, setting up evaluation frameworks, and figuring out why your model performs differently in staging than it did on your dev set. The best ML engineers are obsessive about reproducibility and measurement. They instrument everything. They know that a model is only as good as the data feeding it and the infrastructure serving it.

Across the 4,317 AI roles we're tracking, AI/ML Engineer positions make up 70% of the market. At MaxInsights, this role fits into their broader AI and engineering organization.

Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.

What the Work Looks Like

A typical week might include: debugging a data pipeline that's silently dropping 3% of training examples, running A/B tests on a new model version, writing documentation for a feature flag system that lets you roll back model deployments, and reviewing a junior engineer's PR for a new evaluation metric. Meetings tend to be cross-functional since ML touches product, engineering, and data teams.

Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.

Skills Required

Python (52% of roles) Pytorch (15% of roles) Tensorflow (12% of roles) Transformers (3% of roles)

Python and PyTorch dominate the requirements. Most roles expect experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and familiarity with ML frameworks like TensorFlow or JAX. RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) has become a top-3 skill requirement as companies integrate LLMs into their products. Docker and Kubernetes show up in about a third of postings, reflecting the production focus of the role.

Beyond the core stack, employers increasingly want experience with experiment tracking tools (MLflow, Weights & Biases), feature stores, and vector databases. Fine-tuning experience is valuable but less common than you'd think from reading Twitter. Most production LLM work is RAG and prompt engineering, not fine-tuning. If you have both, you're in a strong position.

Companies that are serious about AI/ML hiring tend to post specific infrastructure details in the job description: the frameworks they use, their model serving stack, their data pipeline tools. Vague postings that just say 'ML experience required' without specifics are often companies that haven't figured out what they need yet.

Compensation Benchmarks

AI/ML Engineer roles pay a median of $214,900 based on 6,420 positions with disclosed compensation. Mid-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $194,400.

Across all AI roles, the market median is $215,000. Top-quartile compensation starts at $266,300. The 90th percentile reaches $320,790. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Safety ($287,500) and Research Engineer ($272,100). By seniority level: Entry: $110,000; Mid: $194,400; Senior: $227,400; Director: $274,554; VP: $241,000.

MaxInsights AI Hiring

MaxInsights has 3 open AI roles right now. They're hiring across AI/ML Engineer. Based in Santa Clara, CA, US.

Location Context

Across all AI roles, 15% (635 positions) offer remote work, while 3,657 require on-site attendance. Top AI hiring metros: New York (1,650 roles, $220,000 median); San Francisco (1,335 roles, $265,000 median); Los Angeles (708 roles, $214,112 median).

Career Path

Common paths into AI/ML Engineer roles include Data Scientist, Software Engineer, Research Engineer.

From here, career progression typically leads toward ML Architect, AI Engineering Manager, Principal ML Engineer.

The fastest path into ML engineering is through software engineering with a self-directed ML education. A CS degree helps, but production engineering skills matter more than academic credentials. Build something that works, deploy it, and measure it. That portfolio project is worth more than a Coursera certificate. For career growth, the fork comes around the senior level: go deep on technical complexity (staff/principal track) or move into managing ML teams.

What to Expect in Interviews

Expect system design questions around ML pipelines: how you'd build a training pipeline for a specific use case, handle data drift, or design A/B testing infrastructure for model deployments. Coding rounds typically involve Python, with emphasis on data manipulation (pandas, numpy) and algorithm implementation. Take-home assignments often ask you to build an end-to-end ML pipeline from raw data to deployed model.

When evaluating opportunities: Companies that are serious about AI/ML hiring tend to post specific infrastructure details in the job description: the frameworks they use, their model serving stack, their data pipeline tools. Vague postings that just say 'ML experience required' without specifics are often companies that haven't figured out what they need yet.

AI Hiring Overview

The AI job market has 4,317 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 138 entry-level, 2,071 mid-level, 1,655 senior, and 453 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 15% of the market (635 positions). The remaining 3,657 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.

The market median for AI roles is $215,000. Top-quartile compensation starts at $266,300. The 90th percentile reaches $320,790. Highest-paying categories: AI Safety ($287,500 median, 34 roles); Research Engineer ($272,100 median, 227 roles); AI Engineering Manager ($244,000 median, 23 roles).

Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.

The AI Job Market Today

The AI job market spans 4,317 open positions across 15 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (3,004), Data Scientist (345), AI Software Engineer (309). These three account for the majority of open positions, though smaller categories often have higher per-role compensation because of specialized skill requirements.

The seniority mix tells a story about where AI teams are in their maturity. Entry-level roles (138) are outnumbered by mid-level (2,071) and senior (1,655) positions, reflecting that most companies are past the 'build a team from scratch' phase and need experienced engineers who can ship production systems. Leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level) total 453 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.

Remote work availability sits at 15% of all AI roles (635 positions), with 3,657 requiring on-site or hybrid attendance. The remote share has stabilized after the post-pandemic correction. Senior and specialized roles (Research Scientist, ML Architect) are more likely to be remote-eligible than entry-level positions, partly because experienced hires have more negotiating power and partly because these roles require less hands-on mentorship.

AI compensation is structured in clear tiers. The market median sits at $215,000. Top-quartile roles start at $266,300, and the 90th percentile reaches $320,790. These figures include base salary with disclosed compensation. Total compensation (including equity, bonuses, and sign-on) runs 20-40% higher at companies that offer those components.

Category matters for compensation. AI Safety roles lead at $287,500 median, while Prompt Engineer roles sit at $145,000. The spread between highest and lowest-paying categories reflects the premium on specialized technical skills versus broader analytical roles.

The most in-demand skills across all AI postings: Python (2,249 postings), Aws (1,224 postings), Azure (938 postings), Rag (915 postings), Gcp (660 postings), Pytorch (640 postings), Prompt Engineering (624 postings), Kubernetes (559 postings). Python dominates, appearing in the vast majority of role descriptions regardless of category. Cloud platform experience (AWS, GCP, Azure) is the second most common requirement. The newer entrants to the top skills list (RAG, vector databases, LLM APIs) reflect the shift from traditional ML toward generative AI applications.

Frequently Asked Questions

Based on 6,420 roles with disclosed compensation, the median salary for AI/ML Engineer positions is $214,900. Actual compensation varies by seniority, location, and company stage.
Python and PyTorch dominate the requirements. Most roles expect experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and familiarity with ML frameworks like TensorFlow or JAX. RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) has become a top-3 skill requirement as companies integrate LLMs into their products. Docker and Kubernetes show up in about a third of postings, reflecting the production focus of the role.
About 15% of the 4,317 AI roles we track offer remote work. Remote availability varies by company and seniority level, with senior and leadership roles more likely to offer location flexibility.
MaxInsights is among the companies actively hiring for AI and ML talent. Check our company profiles for detailed breakdowns of open roles, salary ranges, and hiring trends.
Common next steps from AI/ML Engineer positions include ML Architect, AI Engineering Manager, Principal ML Engineer. Progression depends on whether you lean toward technical depth, people management, or product strategy.

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