Course or self-study?

it all depends how much hours you study/work every day.

learning materials? you can get anywhere, id bet online you can get better materials than college since the artists there come from the industry.
teachers at schools are usually the ones that didn't make it to be animators and they tell everyone bullshit stories.
you can find good tutorials are lynda,udemy,motive3d etc

man up. put 8 hours of 3d work per day. 5 days a week. for one year.
do various projects, one per two weeks
get pirated software (maya or max)
post for critique and listen to the good ones

after one year you will be able to get a job in the industry

>>535747

Don't you need a real portfolio to get accepted to a good art school?

I don't even know who the good schools are besides Gnomon and (I think?) Full Sail, and what makes Gnomon good is all the shit that helps you get a job via contacts and networking

Anyway, you should work some kind of job so you can save up money, while learning on your own and build up a portfolio, and then go to Gnomon

>>535747
Yes.
Source: me.

>>535747
You don't need to go to school if you're skilled at your craft. If you want to animate you could easily make a banging portfolio and get decent positions without any schooling. I mean hell, countless animators from FPSbanana have gotten hired over the years for being impressive and just doing the animations as a hobby. You can too.

>>535777
>Don't you need a real portfolio to get accepted to a good art school?
Can't say the school I got into is "good" because I live in a shithole and there aren't many job opportunities or options. But they thought my shitty sketches and digital art was good enough. And excluding 4-year degree programs, it's the best, most thorough (and quickest) course there is.

Haven't thought of studying abroad, which is probably another thing I'd need to consider in the long run. But I suppose I don't have the talent or money to do that.

I feel like I wasted so much of my life and I wanna make up for it, but at the same time I feel like I'm rushing into things without enough information. Goddamn it.

>>535850
lol fag, am 18 years old and Im gonna go from germany to los angeles to study there next year.

literally me except im actually decent.

If you have the money there are very few places that offer a good education on this field. Otherwise pirate everything you can find and self teach. But depression will be your biggest enemy

>>535859
Must be nice having parents who can afford that shit you entitled cunt.

t. someone who studied abroad because it was cheaper

>>535859
You have one of the top 5 schools in the world in Germany, too.

>>535747
Self taught here, I got lucky and got my first job through nepotism. My skills when I started were mediocre, there was much better options but it was a small company and I could be trusted and didn't have a very large salary. Becuase owner was uncle and I proved myself quickly with teaching myself etc.

That was 6 years ago now, I moved on from uncles place 3 years ago after specializing in a different direction. I'm on 90k a year now leading an Arch Viz team for a large international architecture firm.

Straight up, connections are made in courses. If you are not amazing you can still 'make it' if you can keep up relationships with people you meet in the courses. If not for m uncle I wouldn't have met the people I did and probably never would have got in the door.

So, if you dont know anyone, a course is good, but you better be spending your free time learning as much as possible too.

>>536040
i was kidding anyway, can you tell me some of the " top 5 schools " ?

>>536043
http://www.cgstudentawards.com/magazine/entry/top-20-schools-to-study-vfx-animation-and-next-gen-gaming-for-2015
http://www.therookies.co/education/school-rankings/

File: Screenshot_2016-09-18-19-46-11.jpg (124KB, 720x1280px) Image search: [Google]

124KB, 720x1280px

>>535747
I've been working with anim, and 3d modeling. All it is, is just some knowledge on how to to it, get an idea, animate it and refine it. Just take it in steps. I don't use courses.
( only some YouTube help)
It's about practice mostly. And you need to learn the right way, that will take some self teaching and searching the Internet. Here is my first 3D model

>>535900

mostly this. Your worst enemy (and ally) will be yourself. If you cannot improve your willpower and DO IT, you could go to the most expensive school and waste all your life on it.

tl;dr: pirate videos, books, guides, programs AND DO IT. Like some anon said, if you are NEET do 8 hours, 5 days a week of learning, that's your job now. Or, work part time, save money and study on your free times.

JUST DO IT

Listen to this
https://soundcloud.com/the-collective-podcast/the-collective-ep-7-vitaly

literally all the motivation you need

tl;dl : guy went from no one to top dog in the industry in just 6 years

OP here, I'm still not sure, but in case I go, it will only be (at least) a year from now so I'll have to work on my skills anyway.

And in case I decide taking a course is a waste of time/money, where can I get useful critique? /3/ is great and all but I dobut most people that post here are professionals. How will I know I'm ready for a job or if my showreel is good enough to apply for one?

(Your help is needed: >>536367 >>536042 >>535791)

>>536473
dont take a course, go to cgpeers.com and search up courses you find on these moneybait tutorial websites. you are going to find 95% of them

>>535850
>Can't say the school I got into is "good" because I live in a shithole and there aren't many job opportunities or options. But they thought my shitty sketches and digital art was good enough. And excluding 4-year degree programs, it's the best, most thorough (and quickest) course there is.

This sounds like some operation that's just willing to take your money no matter what. America is full of these actually (I know you're not in America, just pointing it out).

>>535850
>I feel like I'm rushing into things without enough information.

Get active on a 3d site like polycount and reach out to some mature 3d artists; explain to them your situation (via email or PMs or something) and see what they have to say.

At this point it sounds like you need guidance and experience, and you have no on in your life really qualified to help you, ergo you need to reach out to some mentors.

>>536473
>And in case I decide taking a course is a waste of time/money, where can I get useful critique?

Actually /3/ really does give good critique. You can still post your shit on polycount or where ever, but you're going to either get a lot of "nice job!" or (if it's bad) no responses at all.

If you can read between the lines, /3/ gives legit criticism.

Example: "Lmao you fucking faggot nice lighting what is this the 90s? nice HDRI you gaylord your shit is boring garbage, my eyes are literally asleep looking at this shit fucking kill urself MAYA FAGS IN CURRENT YEAR!!"

Actually means "Consider improving the lighting in your scene, perhaps make use of a 3 point lighting system, and an HDRi. The general composition of your scene could be improved by moving objects around to form a more engaging and appealing final render. Maya is an excellent program."

Start up a DeviantArt or Artstation account (though if you're a beginner, this might be a bad idea) and start putting all your shit there, and I mean *all* your shit.

Keep a running thing of all the renders you've ever made, so that you can look back at something you made six months ago, a year ago, two years ago, three years ago.

>>536551
>This sounds like some operation that's just willing to take your money no matter what.
Not entirely true, I know of some that got rejected, and some that wanted to get into long/advanced classes and were forced to start on the short courses because their skills or knowledge weren't good enough. Still, I'm sure they're fairly lenient

Thank you for your offer.

>>536554
Will do.