subject: Being An Animator [print this page] Animators have the best job on earth and there are lots of jobs that require animation knowledge. They range from working in tv and marketing, to performing medical illustration animations, effects on movies, or 3D fly-throughs for architectural firms and product designers. By far the most desired animator job handles character animation, the art of bringing animated characters to life in animated films, Television shows and video games. In addition to character animation, other jobs within this industry include creating storyboards, rendering and lighting scenes, creating hair and clothing, making models and doing 2D or stop-motion animation.
Character animators focus exclusively on making a character act. The job relies on the animators creativity to create an acting performance and bring a character to life through movement and expressions. In professional visualization and simulation, you might be doing aspects such as architectural renderings for interior designs or landscaping for parks. Another part of simulation is in medical animations that show how medicine interacts with the body or demonstrates surgical techniques. Animators are also utilized in law enforcement for crime scene reconstruction to show investigators and juries how an event could have happened. Production work usually requires building, rigging and texturing models as well as animating characters for a final scenes. Rendering is used to output animation sequences which are ready for editing and compositing.
Check out a few of the job titles and job types you may encounter in the animation world.
2D Animators use drawing, composition, and perspective to produce proportion, line of action, structure, and basic anatomy, while working in areas as varied as animation, character design, clean-up, doping, modeling, slugging, and storyboarding.
3D Animators use software programs and rigs to complete many of the same things 2D animators do.
Character Animators create an acting performance and bring a character to life through movement and expressions, in spite of medium.
Character FX (hair/cloth/fur) artists are responsible for the appearance of character effects such as cloth and fur simulations. They develop tools to further improve the pipeline. An understanding of Maya, rigging tools and surface modeling techniques helps.
Modelers create 3D models of characters and settings based upon preliminary illustrations.
Renderers deal with the render farm, the group of machines which actually render the 3D models into working animation.
Lighting supervisors make the lighting look, processes and techniques required to portray the art directors vision of the film. They recommend lighting pipelines, tools and operations for CG production.
Matte painters design environments in accordance with the story and script. They are painters and artists that can conceptualize and visualize ideas including complex backgrounds, landscapes and environments. They will use tools like Photoshop, Maya and Renderman.
Roto artists work to embed an animated character into a live-action scene and/or improve the sense of depth (such as putting a character behind a tree).
Storyboard artists translate scripts into images that best convey the situation. They plan and coordinate images from thumbnails for planning shots that visually demonstrate how a story will develop.
The best way to get information about specific skills and requirements for various types of animation jobs is to keep an eye on job listings. Most disclose the requirements in great detail in addition to any specialized training or experience that may be necessary.
