Software Optimization Engineer – GPU / Hardware-Accelerated Media (FFmpeg / HandBrake / Intel Quick Sync Video)

Job Title

Software Optimization Engineer – GPU / Hardware-Accelerated Media (FFmpeg / HandBrake / Intel Quick Sync Video)

Role Summary

Work on hardware-accelerated video solutions for Intel Graphics platforms by contributing to open-source media projects and collaborating with ISVs, broadcasters, and internal engineering teams. The role focuses on optimizing encode/decode/transcode pipelines and integrating Intel media technologies into consumer and professional media workflows.

The position involves upstreaming patches, performance analysis, and cross-team technical influence across software and hardware groups.

Experience Level

Mid-level to senior engineering role; requires substantial practical experience in media software and hardware-accelerated video development. (No explicit years-of-experience number provided.)

Responsibilities

Primary engineering and community-facing responsibilities:

• Analyze, design, develop, debug, and upstream enhancements to FFmpeg, HandBrake, and related open-source media projects.
• Develop, optimize, and maintain Intel Quick Sync Video code paths via oneVPL/VPL, libmfx, VA-API, and D3D11/12 Video backends.
• Profile and optimize hardware-accelerated encode/decode/transcode pipelines; run workload and quality analyses (PSNR, SSIM, VMAF).
• Engage with open-source maintainers and ISV partners: author patches, participate in code reviews, and act as Intel’s technical representative.
• Provide technical training, consultation, and hands-on assistance to maintainers and partners on media architecture and performance tuning.
• Collect and provide technical feedback to product, architecture, and driver teams to improve media hardware and software.
• Author technical content (presentations, blog posts, talks) and contribute to go-to-market technical activities.

Requirements

Must-have skills and experience; "Nice-to-have" items listed separately.

• Must-have: Advanced programming experience in modern C and C++.
• Must-have: Hands-on experience with hardware-accelerated video APIs such as Intel Quick Sync Video/oneVPL/libmfx, VA-API, D3D11/12 Video (DXVA), NVENC/NVDEC, or equivalent.
• Must-have: Practical contribution experience to FFmpeg, HandBrake, or similar open-source media projects (e.g., libav, GStreamer, x264/x265, SVT-AV1, dav1d).
• Must-have: Solid understanding of modern video codecs (AVC/H.264, HEVC/H.265, AV1, VP9) and media containers/streaming protocols (MP4, MKV, MPEG-TS, RTMP, SRT, HLS, DASH).
• Strong problem-solving, communication, and collaboration skills; experience working in public mailing lists and open-source review processes.
• Ability to work independently and provide technical leadership to partners and maintainers.
• Nice-to-have: Experience with AI-assisted media workflows (super-resolution, denoising, frame interpolation) using OpenVINO, ONNX Runtime, DirectML, or PyTorch.
• Nice-to-have: Low-level GPU programming experience (Vulkan Video, OpenGL, DirectX, Metal) or compute APIs (SYCL, DPC++, OpenCL, CUDA).
• Nice-to-have: Familiarity with Intel tooling (VTune, Graphics Trace Analyzer, Metrics Discovery API, Intel C/C++ Compiler, TBB) and media driver components (media-driver, libva, intel-vaapi-driver).
• Nice-to-have: Experience with CI-driven builds/packaging for open-source media stacks and experience managing relationships with open-source maintainers and ISV partners.

Education Requirements

Required: Degree or equivalent practical experience in a scientific or engineering discipline (e.g., Computer Science, Electrical Engineering) or equivalent experience. Preferred: Ph.D. in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or a related field.

About the Company

Company: Intel Corporation

Headquarters: Santa Clara, California, USA

Intel Corporation is a leading multinational technology company known for its innovative semiconductor solutions, including microprocessors, artificial intelligence accelerators, and memory products. Headquartered in the United States, Intel focuses on cutting-edge technology and a collaborative working environment, driving advancements in semiconductor manufacturing to meet global demands. The company emphasizes professional development and aims to shape the future of technology through groundbreaking designs.