AAS in Animation? Done. What next? Guidance on my degree crossroads
polycounter lvl 14
Hey guys, I have a question for those working in either the film or gaming industry. For reference though, I'm trying to break into the game industry. I would like to hear it from both worlds though.
I have three more weeks left of classes before I get my Associate of Applied Science Degree in Computer Animation. It's not from a well known school, the instruction and content wasn't the best, we only had three 10-week animation classes, and the program was only 3 years old. But, it was what I could afford and I think I made the best of it. An associates is meant to get your feet wet. My knowledge is a mile wide but only six feet deep. I want to expand it, but I also feel as though I can teach myself from this point out. So do I need more than an AAS?
Question: Right now I have two choices: I can either go on and get my Bachelors in Animation (possibly from Devry), or, get a Bachelors in Computer Science. For breaking into the industry, what route reaps the best outcomes?
I know there are more factors of successfully breaking in than just your degree. There's professionalism, aptitude, talent and skill to name a few. Even then, I know it's not a done deal for getting in. It's a competitive industry, or so I hear.
Anyway, thanks for taking the time to read. I could really use some guidance here.
I have three more weeks left of classes before I get my Associate of Applied Science Degree in Computer Animation. It's not from a well known school, the instruction and content wasn't the best, we only had three 10-week animation classes, and the program was only 3 years old. But, it was what I could afford and I think I made the best of it. An associates is meant to get your feet wet. My knowledge is a mile wide but only six feet deep. I want to expand it, but I also feel as though I can teach myself from this point out. So do I need more than an AAS?
Question: Right now I have two choices: I can either go on and get my Bachelors in Animation (possibly from Devry), or, get a Bachelors in Computer Science. For breaking into the industry, what route reaps the best outcomes?
I know there are more factors of successfully breaking in than just your degree. There's professionalism, aptitude, talent and skill to name a few. Even then, I know it's not a done deal for getting in. It's a competitive industry, or so I hear.
Anyway, thanks for taking the time to read. I could really use some guidance here.
Replies
If you feel you have the knowledge to teach yourself from this point, then save yourself a mountain of debt and possibly 3-4 wasted years of your life, and don't bother with getting a BA. Put all your focus on your work and skill, forget about fancy Bachelor degrees from expensive schools.
But point taken. I agree and will work on polishing things this summer.
From a paycheck perspective, does a bachelors provide you with a higher entry-level pay position?
I'm also slightly looking forward to being rounded out with all the programming knowledge I will get it. However, it might be a distraction for the next two years while I balance four classes and work on animation stuff, and work a couple jobs.
"no.. portfolio portfolio portfolio... degrees are meaningless in this industry".
Bachelors will not give you a higher entry level pay position.
Demand for your services will.
Demand for your services will increase with an amazing portfolio and experience.
The benefit of having a computer science degree though is when your hard pressed to get a industry job you can use it to fudge your way into other computer jobs in the meantime.
http://www.animationmentor.com/
You're being taught by guys from Dreamworks, Sony Pictureworks and Pixar. I don't believe it's an accredited degree granting program, but you'll be hard pressed to find better animation instruction than this.
This is assuming you're actually interested in ANIMATION, and not modelling/texturing.
mate, do folio work on the type of stuff you want to do in the industry. Dont worry about wether this route or that route is a better way to break in. The question you should be asking yourself is what do I want to specialise in. The industry is too competitive in for people to stumble in without any direction or specialisation. It takes years to get good enough at one thing to get a decent job in the industry.
good luck.
Do you get my drift... If you want to learn animation, and spend 20K go buy that video tutorial library of, eh, I don't know the name. LOL I can't remember, but it was listed here. Or just go to a library and read the book and practice what it says. You should still have enough money to buy a good computer and the software. So go practice and avoid wasting money.
Once you are done make some loopable animations of a character, walking, talking, fighting, etc. Learn how to setup IK, and do morph targets. Show your work here and I'm sure people will tell if it's good or you need to do more work to improve. While you do this try and get an internship in a game company as an animator. Actually if you haven't started, you should start doing what I just wrote in the last paragraph.
Good luck.
I will agree that animation mentor is awesome, an animator I used to work with went through it and he learned TONS and felt it was well worth his time and money. He's now working at Dreamworks.
I do want to get a bachelors in something though. As Ericdigital said above, one of the reasons to get a bachelors is to fall back on something should you be hard pressed to get into the industry. Asmuel also touched on the fact that you need to be experienced and specialized to get in. So it sounds to me like I need to have a few things I can do in the meantime.
Therefore I'll most likely be going with my college's online Game Software Development degree. All in all it will be 134 credits at $190 a credit hour coming out to be about $25,460.
It may sound counter productive... "I'm going to get a bachelors as something to fall back on in case I'm hard pressed to break in... so I'm going to get another game dev degree!" But I honestly think I can make it work. There's going to be a good amount of programming knowledge gleamed from these courses (I can not self teach myself programming, just doesn't work), and just like Animation, it's not like it's industry specific. I can take animation to film, medical or military fields just as fast as I can take it to gaming. Same thing with programming. Sure the courses are geared towards it, but it won't be hard to show off work in non-game related projects.
Plus, I have no passion for the courses that are in a normal Bachelors degree. Just so you can compare, I'll post the rotation for both.
Bachelors of Computer Science Game Software Development
Bachelor of Computer Science Note, I said 134 above when I did my math. That's the number of hours I'll have to deal with after articulation from my animation degree is applied. It wipes out a lot of core classes and overlapping subjects.
So? Not bad eh? I am very interested in the game programming side and would probably take classes on it in the future anyway. So not only would I be able to animate, I could do programming as well. I'm bound to get a job somewhere, industry or not. And it's not that expensive comparitively.
Most of the classes are actually the same. And the classes that only the normal bachelors has are classes that would put me to sleep, and that's the meat of the degree!
PS: The Animation Mentor program is amazing, I'll grant you that. But I'm trying to focus on environments and assets more than characters and animation. I seem to have a bit more talent and ability to visualize things better in that area.
(Subway related stuff has a few more weeks of development to go)
@Ben Apuna: I somewhat agree with your view. I understand that being a jack of all trades (well, just programming and animation) moves you further away from being specialized, which doesn't exactly make you more employable.
However, if what was said above about "Portfolio Portfolio Portfolio" is true, then that point shouldn't be of huge concern to me. Of course I will be concentrating on the animation side of things. But with programming to compliment my work, make me versatile in smaller teams (going the indie/modding route into the industry), and give me a background and understanding from a project management perspective of what sort of deliverables both sides need in order to get the job done well... I think that's a huge plus.
I don't want to stay animator the rest of my life. I do want to do some indie stuff, maybe even get into a project management position, and hopefully start my own company one day if I get good enough at what I do. That's where I see myself 10 years down the road at least.
A degree could open up opportunities that you wouldn't otherwise have. For example, it will be easier for employers in a foreign country to get you a work visa if they are interested in hiring you. Also, while a degree won't make a difference in the game industry, it will make a difference outside of the industry if you find yourself unable to break in or if you do break in and find it is not for you.
I am interested in working in a foreign country, so that is a plus. Didn't know that!
Yup, never hurts to know how to do more than one thing so I can fallback on it.
I don't know if Mop was being sarcastic? I mean most of the TDs I have seen were artists in the past, and rather good ones. At some point they had an interest in scripting to speed up their workflow and in the end became tool makers/TDs. For instance one needs to know first hand the bottlenecks of an art pipeline (by experiencing them 24/7) to then work them out.
As a matter of fact I have also seen TDs being 'left behind' as soon as they don't keep up with art techniques. Obviously it can be worked out. But the best way to stay ontop of things is to still make art (the best TD I have worked with was doing kickass character art in the weekends).
Also to speak the harsh truth : you have a ton of work ahead... This is just honest feedback here but the stuff you just showed is not yet job-worthy (from a modelling point of view). This might sound very harsh but all shown above could be done under maybe, a weekend worth of work?
I would recommend sticking around web communities (here but also more high end 3D ones not necessarily about games) to see the current standards.
Best luck for everything man!
Not harsh at all, I agree. My standards for myself are very high, and this stuff doesn't even come close to meeting my own goals let alone the quality of industry work. That's mainly why I haven't shown any of my work here yet. I know I would get some good C&C, but if it doesn't even get passed my own why waste everyone's time? I can sit around here all day and give valid excuses on why my stuff isn't up to snuff, but the bottom line is, it's my responsibility to improve. And that's exactly what I'll be working hard on this summer. So Pior, everyone, keep your eyes on me, I want this. Thanks for setting the bar =]
What would you consider a high end 3D community? CGSociety? Just curious. I know of several, but if you have one you can point me too I'll check them out.
Feeling it out first might help you make more of an informed decision and there are frickin' thousands of tutorials online to get your feet wet, but this can be a minefield as some really aweful stuff online too.
For game programming http://www.gamedev.net/ is a decent place to have a browse around some of the topics.
You could also get a C/C++ primer text book and have a flick though, I would recommend:
[ame]http://www.amazon.co.uk/C-Programming-Language-2nd/dp/0131103628/ref=wl_it_dp?ie=UTF8&coliid=I2IGH8V69A8DU8&colid=KWC1CUMNWC45[/ame]
or
[ame]http://www.amazon.co.uk/C-Primer-Stanley-B-Lippman/dp/0201721481/ref=wl_it_dp?ie=UTF8&coliid=I1DYR8VTTD8AQZ&colid=KWC1CUMNWC45[/ame]
Data structures is a key programming subject for games, and one of the ones new people tend to struggle with, some say the most.
Also a good head for maths certainly helps if you want to be good at programming, some people forget that.
So while you're working on your comp sci degree... keep your portfolio up to date and keep making it better as time allows.
A degree in just art isn't going to get you much, I'm glad you're branching. Degree's in other areas definitely help out, and even come in handy when looking outside the industry for work.
As for other sites, also check out:
http://cghub.com/
http://www.3dtotal.com/
http://www.11secondclub.com/
Thanks for all the advice guys, you've given me some great insight. I have a lot to work on, and work towards, but I'm very excited about it. See you around the forums =]
The animation AAS I found didn't give much more than a decent starting point for anything in 3D animation/art, and have found that I learn much more by just hanging around these boards, looking through tutorials, watching gnomon/eat3D/DT videos, etc. I don't know how it was at your campus, but I feel bad about most of the other people in my classes, as they just don't seem to get what needs to be done to get into these industries, regardless of what myself or the instructor tells them, and they think they will have no problem with what they have learned just in these classes.
Well, I'm glad to see somebody else coming out of the same program with some ambition and realization that this is going to take some real work.