Empower your creativity and visualize your dreams with a major in Animation.
Major Roadmap
Explore your options — classes, internships, research and study abroad. Utilize the Animation Major Guide to find what interests you, discover what you love, and create a major experience that jumpstarts your future.
Your study of Animation at St. Edward’s will start with a solid foundation in drawing, script writing, and sequential art, then progress to visual design, storyboarding and sound design. You can then connect your new skills and build your portfolio by producing your very own animated films.
Located in the Department of Visual Studies within the School of Arts and Humanities, Animation curriculum will expose you to a wide range of techniques, all aimed at helping you to express your ideas within a liberal arts context. You will create projects which reflect the skills critical to success in this growing field, including traditional hand-drawn or vector-art animation, stop-motion animation, kinestasis, rotoscoping and motion capture, motion graphics, computer-rendered three-dimensional animation, visual effects animation, and compositing animated elements over live-action video.
Our graduates are prepared to work in a wide range of roles and disciplines in the technology, game development, commercial art, and filmed entertainment industries.
Central Texas is one of the fastest-growing regions for film, video games, and a host of growing tech industries. Employers such as Rooster Teeth Productions and Powerhouse Animation Studio have helped to established Austin as a leading hub of animation jobs in the country. Animation faculty work closely with the office of Career and Professional Development to identify jobs and internship opportunities to help you learn from the best.
The Classroom and Beyond
Because the St. Edward’s Animation major is a small, personalized program, you’ll get plenty of hands-on training with multiple types of equipment, and you’ll learn from professionals in the industry who visit campus. Austin is an animation hotspot, and you’ll have opportunities to intern with local studios and get involved in the South by Southwest Conference and Festivals, the Austin Film Festival and RTX, Rooster Teeth’s marquee animation, gaming and entertainment event.
Experiential Education
The hallmark of the St. Edward’s Animation program is practical, active learning in a personal environment. Your animation classroom has workstations with flexible Cintiq pen displays and stop-motion cameras. Plus, you’ll be able to book creative work time in specialized studios with tabletop stations and lighting for traditional 2D animation and 3D stop-motion animation.
- In Foundations in Animation, you’ll learn a range of techniques that will empower you to create short animation projects including stop motion, traditional hand-drawn, and even sand animation.
- In Animation Production, you’ll pull from all your animation experiences and spend the entire semester planning, writing, designing, recording, and creating the audio for your own short animated film.
You’ll also have the chance to learn from – and network with – guest speakers from the industry. Past guests have included voice talent and producer from Rooster Teeth, a writer who has worked on various animated shows and for DC Comics, and the voice director for multiple Triple-A video games.
Student Organizations
The Asian Pop Culture Club is your home for discussions of all things anime, K-pop, and other aspects of Asian pop culture.
Are you an editorial cartoonist? Submit your work to Hilltop Views, the weekly student newspaper, which covers news from the campus and greater Austin community.
B. Hooved is the student humor journal, inspired by our Hilltopper goat mascot.
Command G is the graphic design club. Members visit local museums and design studios, host critique nights, and create their own designs in button-making, screen-printing and risograph workshops.
The St. Edward’s Maker Club attracts tinkerers and programmers who have worked on projects involving 3-D printing, soldering, programming LED strips, and creating art through programming.
Topper Studios is the digital media club. Members are involved in creating podcasts, YouTube channels, short films, music videos and comedy sketches, and helping their fellow students produce digital content. Students in Topper Studios also frequently make promotional videos for other clubs at St. Edward’s.
The Digital Media Center in the Munday Library is a resource for creating your own content and learning new skills. Here you can produce and edit videos, podcasts and visual design projects with the help of your fellow students. The lab is equipped with top-of-the-line computers running the latest software including the Adobe Creative Suite. It also has a group editing/podcasting room, a green screen room and a “whisper room” used for voiceovers. If you are skilled at software, hardware repair, graphic design or video editing, you can apply to work in the lab as a digital media specialist.
Degree Requirements
Major Requirements: The Bachelor of Arts with a major in Animation requires 60 hours of core coursework. The Animation program offers students a strong foundation year which encourages skill development, experimentation and independent thought. In sophomore year students focus on media exploration and skill development through courses in animation foundations, sequential art, screenwriting and audio. A mixture of video game animation courses and fine arts courses support both technical and conceptual development that is essential for emerging animators. Upper level courses include Kinestasis and Motion Graphics, Compositing and Visual Effects, and Animation Production. Students conclude their studies through the culminating experience course sequence, Senior Studio I and II, which require the development of an independent creative project, a senior animation screening, and a thesis paper.
General Education Requirements: The Animation degree requires an average of 38-44 hours of general education courses that students complete over four years in addition to their major courses and electives.
View and download the full degree plan for the Animation major.
Courses in the Animation program include:
- Kinestasis and Motion Graphics – Focuses on traditional and digital techniques designed to make images and text more lively across a range of implementations appropriate for animated films, video games, presentations, and web design.
- Compositing and Visual Effects – This is an advanced digital animation course that builds upon fundamentals from prior courses to explore a range of techniques that combine multiple visual elements within a single shot, including rotoscoping, digital motion capture, transformation, lighting, and particle effects.
- Animation Production – The course covers all the necessary steps to produce a short digitally animated narrative film, from concept to final mix.
Animation Minor
A minor in Animation can equip graduates with a wide range of career options. Students must take the following courses, totaling 24 hours:
- Foundation Drawing
- Playwriting Workshop I
- Sequential Art
- Foundations of Animation
- Introduction to Game Audio
- Introduction to Game Animation
- Advanced Game Animation
- Animation Production
Are you a current student? Contact your advisor for next steps on declaring your major or minor.
For more information about the Animation minor:
Contact Robert Denton Bryant, director of Video Game Development and Animation