<p>My son has been accepted into Texas A&M's Visualization Arts program and the University of Texas at Dallas' Arts and Technology program. We would appreciate any insight anyone has into the two academic programs and the advantages/disadvantages of one vs the other. We especially welcome comments on the specifics of the two programs and future employments opportunities granted by graduation from one vs. another, as well as university life. In general, we are very familiar with Texas A&M and not so much with UTD. Most important to my son is the program, not the school. He is very smart (34 ACT), very focused on working for a movie or game design studio, and very much a computer geek (awkward, anxious, not very social). Thank you for your time.</p>
<p>A&M Visualization Arts program is the best animation program in Texas and the hardest to get into. It’s very small, and graduates are heavily recruited by Pixar, Blue Sky, Industrial Light & Magic, DreamWorks/PDI, LucasFilm Animation, Reel FX Creative Studios, Walt Disney Animation, Rhythm & Hue, and Sony Pictures Imageworks, though GRADUATE students with Master degree have much better chances than undergrads.
I know only 1 person from my D’s school who was in the undergrad program, and he went to graduate school at Carnegie Melon right after A&M.
You can only look at their news pages. Aggie “Vizzers” worked for Brave, Cars 2, Rango, Rio, Tangled, Free Birds, WALL•E, Harry Potter and Pirates of the Caribbean etc.
Here they even listed all the people and their positions
[24</a> Aggies help create ‘Brave’ - Department of Visualization](<a href=“Visualization - Texas A&M University School of Performance, Visualization & Fine Arts”>Visualization - Texas A&M University School of Performance, Visualization & Fine Arts)</p>
<p>UT Dallas ATEC is more into video games, though they have animation classes too. Students work more locally in places like Real FX, Janimatoin, Gearbox, iD Software, and Texas Instruments.</p>
<p>This program is actually competing with UT Austin new Game Development program that was introduced this year. [Game</a> Development Program](<a href=“Game Development and Design Program – The University of Texas at Austin”>http://gamedev.utexas.edu/) UT Dallas even started teaching communication classes.</p>