Students at work at Carnegie Mellon University. Courtesy of Carnegie Mellon University.

Studio Arts has undergone tremendous changes in just the last two years. We have re-worked our core curriculum and individual courses to reflect the huge changes in display media, storage capacity, speed of delivery and greater bandwidth that affect film, television and Internet capability. One example would be our use of HD... HDTV, its 16:9 format and its eventual incorporation into games and film, is becoming a prevalent standard and thus a logical format from which Studio Arts has begun to provide program delivery.
Studio Arts
Glendale, California

At Filmakademie Baden-Wuerttemberg, most teachers are guest teachers, professionals working in the industry, who come to Filmakademie for a seminar or workshop. Thus, the curriculum can permanently be adjusted to the actual needs of students and industry, and the course schedules stay flexible. Furthermore, the Institute of Animation tries to pick up creative and technical trends in animation and visual effects by contacts to various companies and studios. One example was the implementation of a new two-year program in 2002 for training to become a technical director.
Institute of Animation, Visual Effects and Digital Post-Production
Germany

The most significant change we’ve made recently is to incorporate a wider set of software skills into our introductory courses. The skills needed to produce quality work always span a variety of packages rather than just one. This was something our courses factored in from the beginning, but we’ve recently expanded the software portfolio of each course to give students a deeper understanding of the discipline. For example, an introductory 3D program that predominantly uses Maya will also include the effective use of packages such as Photoshop, combustion, Premier, mental ray, as well as DVD encoding software and network render management utilities, etc.
Escape Studios
London, England

We are working now digital. Capturing each frame with a program.
Artemia Films
Santiago, Chile

Who do you perceive as your market and how are you addressing the ever-changing industry needs of your region?

We have upgraded our digital cinema labs and animation facilities. In addition, we are looking at the possibility of requiring students to buy laptop computers and digital editing/fx/animation software for some of the advanced courses. Computer companies (Apple, Dell, etc.) are willing to offer substantial discounts to students and make financing possible for hardware/software. There is also financial aid available through the university.
San Francisco State University
San Francisco, California

The present market is the growing 3D & 2D animation houses struggling to meet the requirements of the booming entertainment industry. By keeping the talent sharpening intact, the emerging new software, hardware technologies are introduced to the students to keep them abreast of the new production techniques.
Toonz Animation
India

Our graduates split down the middle-half are teaching in colleges and half are animators in game or film companies. We are exploring adding a gaming track.
Center for Electronic Communication
Florida Atlantic University
Ft. Lauderdale, Florida