What You Will Learn

Over the course of six months, students create a film of their own from concept through production. This process includes intense story research and development, modeling and animating hard and soft geometry, rigging characters for effective movement, texturing and lighting scenes, and working with experienced sound designers and editors.

The following are major areas of study as you're making your film. For a term-by-term breakdown of what you will learn, see the Digital Character Animation curriculum. To see it all put into practice, check out Student Case Study - The Making of Cricket.

Character Animation

At the core of your animation studies is Autodesk Maya. You'll begin the program with a brief refresher in foundational animation tools, and will then immediately start building on those skills through simulation methods and by exploring topics like particle dynamics, soft and rigid body dynamics, fur, hair and cloth, and fluid dynamics. To enhance your character animation skills and give you the best foundation for creating an excellent final project, you will also study facets of filmmaking like cinematography (for designing the perfect shots) and acting (helping you truly understand the human form and physical movement).

Under the supervision of instructors and industry mentors, you will be responsible for the full production of your final film. You'll follow a production schedule and deliver shots by specified deadlines - just as in a studio production environment. In the home stretch, you'll work with sound and post-production teams to finish your project.

The result is a polished film you can enter into festivals, as well as a demo reel that demonstrates your professional skills.

Concept Development

In order to create the strongest possible piece for your final project, you begin discussing the story and design for your film from the very first week of the program. You will pitch and refine the script, research your character's background and the visual design of the story, and will create a design booklet, concept drawings, storyboards, and 2D and 3D animatics.

Modeling

Before you can animate your character for your film, you'll need to create the 3D model. In the modeling courses, you'll study the techniques and tools for creating 3D models in Maya, with the primary focus on Polygonal modeling techniques. You will also study methodologies using NURBS and Subdivision Surfaces.

Character Setup

A 3D model is only as good as its setup. You will learn to rig, skin, and test your character skeleton, ensuring its movement - from walking, running, and jumping right down to its facial expressions - is authentic and smooth. A strong character setup allows maximum creativity when animating - crucial when it's your own model you're animating, and a valuable skill in an industry in which you may be setting up characters for other artists to animate.

Rendering

To achieve the perfect, polished look for your animation, you'll develop an in-depth understanding of Maya techniques that allow you to create both realistic and cartoon-style surface appearances on your models. You will also study lighting with Maya, texturing with Photoshop, and will have the option of learning to render with Pixar's RenderMan - and the results of student films using RenderMan speak for themselves.

Before production on your film begins, you will review, with the guidance of instructors and industry mentors, the best modeling, texturing, and rendering techniques for your film.