GUEST POST: Things You Need to Do in Becoming an Animator Student Becoming an animator takes time, research, and patience - here are advice and tips from one of PortPrep's student on how to become an animator.
By Karen Kesteloot
For the next few days, we’ll let Puneet Jagwani, one of PortPrep’s students, take the stage on the blog to tell his experiences what he’s been doing to turn his dreams of becoming an animator come into reality. In his guest post below, he suggests ideas to reader that he’s done himself in order to get to Sheridan College and to inspire readers to follow his lead and pursue their dreams of becoming a professional artist!
How I Plan to Follow my Dream of Becoming an Animator By Puneet Jagwani
Applying for college can be stressful, and waiting for your acceptance (or even rejection) letters even more so. Don’t worry too much if you aren’t accepted; plan for it! I want to go to Sheridan College in Oakville Ontario Canada to study traditional animation, one of the most competitive and difficult programs to get accepted into. The only way I know this is because of the research I did about the program beforehand. Research Where to Study and Know the Odds I looked into a few animation schools before deciding I wanted to go to Sheridan. There is a lot of demand for the program, and it may be obvious now, but before I did some research, I thought just anyone could apply to the program. I was very wrong about that. On average, approximately 2500 people apply to the traditional animation program with only 150 acceptances. And computer animation is typically what animation students do after graduating, where 200 people apply and a mere 30 get in!
To even be considered for the program I need to be very skilled in the traditional arts (something I barely did in high school). So instead of applying directly to animation, I have to work on my foundations first. This means thinking about what courses or programs I need to take in college, how much work I have to put in outside of school practicing, and doing anything I can to get myself ahead. Get My Basic Skills Down: Take a Local Drawing Course
Puneet’s drawing before Karen’s instructor.
The first thing I did was sign up for a basic adult interest drawing course at the Guelph School of Art with Karen Kesteloot. The lessons were invaluable and I came back for a follow-up course because I liked it so much! The improvement between my before and after drawings have amazed both me and my classmates!
Puneet’s drawing after Karen’s instructor.
Find a Portfolio Coach or Arts Guidance Counselor Karen happened to be a professional portfolio coach at PortPrep. That was a lucky break! After learning so much from her, I was happy to write this blog when she asked me to for her website. I am so grateful that she has taught me so well and has given so much great advice on the strategy of my education plan. She’s been really straight forward and to-the-point about where my skills are now and where they need to be; and has told me what I need to do in order to develop my skills to the level that they will need to be to get accepted into such a high level and sought after program.
Apply to the Right Foundations Study College Program While working on my basic drawing skills, I also applied and got accepted into Sheridan College’s Visual and Creative Arts (VCA) program (a 2 to 3 year diploma course). I could have considered Art Fundamentals at Sheridan too but I learned that with it being only one year long that it would be insufficient to get accepted into Animation. So the VCA was the better choice since I don’t have the skill level yet to get accepted into the Illustration program there. It’s probably the most common route that the students take; to first study in the Illustration program and then apply to Animation. But that is not an option for me yet…
To read the rest of the article, click here or go to http://bit.ly/becomingananimator.