Hey, I though I'd get your opinion on my situation:
I am currently a sophomore at Colgate University (small liberal arts college in central New York) studying Computer Science and Mathematics. I an not really happy here, but decided that I should just stick it out because of some study abroad opportunities and monetary concerns, but the study abroad fell through and now I have decided to reevaluate my situation. I am interested in getting into the field of computer/3D animation. I was hoping to pursue it after graduation, but now I’m thinking I should just leave here and perhaps start over.
I am a little tremulous about applying to and attending an art school because the last art classes I took were in high school. While I would not consider myself an extraordinary or accomplished artist, I am not horrible beyond helping—I think I just need practice and instruction. I am very detail oriented and mathematical as opposed to creative and expressive, which I suppose could be both a good and bad thing.
So basically I was wondering what my best bets would be, should I take a year off and take art classes requesting to transfer into a school that offers animation, or should I just start my undergraduate career anew? Would it be wiser for me to finish my education here and try for the graduate school route?
Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated.
Oh man, giving life advice is so far out of my field of expertise. You can never get enough school, and while it used to be that your demo reel was all you needed, in the area of Computer Animation, your education actually does influence your hirability (*disclaimer; your demo reel is still most important).
As such, Pixar has listed their recommended schools for learning computer animation and other related skills used in their company. You can find it at this link:
http://www.pixar.com/companyinfo/jobs/schools.html
If you're sure you want to go into computer animation, I'd suggest just transferring. If you're into Computer Science there's a lot of those guys that make great Techincal Directors and programmers for shaders and such. It's a good field because it panders to tech-heads more than creatives and so those positions are always looking for talent and tend to pay pretty well. That's the best advice I can give you. But you need to decide for yourself.