This is Ringling’s program philosophy from Jim McCampbell who is head of CA at Ringling. It was written in 2007 on a forum and while the program has evolved over the years (Ringling is very responsive to the industry), the philosophy remains the same as when my D attended.
I’m posting this because the philosophies about what is taught and why is very different between schools. I’m hoping that such a good explanation of “what we do and why we do it” will help in your decision making if you are considering Ringling. Remember that Ringling’s motto is “shattering the myth of the starving artist”.
"Ringling’s CA program teaches you to be a complete filmmaker. Although the main focus is on character animation and storytelling, we feel it is in your best interest as an artist to go beyond the restrictions of just character animation.
Look at it this way. There are almost 500 different schools out there teaching computer animation. Almost every student in almost every school wants to go work as an animator at Pixar, Dreamworks, Imageworks, etc. But the truth of the matter is that there are only a handful of studios with a production pipeline that allow you to do just character animation and nothing else. And, of that handful of studios, each has only a handful of entry-level jobs for character animators each year. The result is thousands of people applying for about 40 jobs. Those are not good odds.
By teaching you a larger skillset, we increase your odds of finding gainful employment upon graduation. Unless you are talented enough and fortunate enough to earn one of those cherished few spots, you will need to be able to cover a larger set of responsibilities in your work. There will be nobody to build and rig that character for you, nobody to light and texture it… in fact, there is a good chance you will be designing the character yourself (which I personally would view as a privilege).
So, here we focus heavily on character animation, but you learn to do it all. After all, it is a BFA degree. I can’t tell you how many times I have seen people who entered the program thinking they wanted to be a character animator, only to discover that they loved lighting… or modeling even more.
We place a significant number of graduates in the “big” studios each year. Their well-rounded educations make them better at what they do than they would have been without it. Being complete filmmakers also increases their odds of becoming supervisors and directors someday. And for those grads who aren’t quite Dreamworks material yet, it is good to know that because they are able to work across the entire production pipeline, they still have a fantastic chance of getting a good job at a studio where they will have a larger set of responsibilities.
Think about it… thousands of people competing for a handful of jobs… every one of them believing that they are one of the ones who will be chosen. Someone is going to be left without a chair when the music stops. I believe Ringling is taking the right approach, and the track record is there to support that belief."–Jim McCampbell (2007)
