Best 3D Animation Courses
Some Really Good Animation Courses
Free tutorials are great. I’ve learned a whole lot from them. That said, the best investment you can make is in yourself. If that investment can save you time and give you usable knowledge, it’s often worth a little money. I’ve learned from both and recommend, well, check them out. – UDEMY ones are mostly on sale at the moment!
Creating 3D Environments in Blender
I bought this course and can say it’s awesome. While it’s not in Blender 2.8 (yet), but 2.79, you can apply it to any software. It covers inspiration, modeling, texturing, lighting, and exporting to Unity 3D. It comes with 250 2K-4K texture maps, as well as a 250 page ebook on the old master artists. I wrote a review here.
Blender 2.8 – The Complete Guide from Beginner to Pro
At over 4000 Students, this course boasts over a 3.5 star review. It’s 33 hours of everything you want to know to get started and create cool stuff in Blender 2.8. The list of topics you’ll learn is exhaustive and if you want ONE all up course in Blender 3D 2.8, this is it.
Space VFX
The Ultimate Guide To Creating The Galaxy In Blender
Have you ever wanted to be a sci-fi filmmaker? Create your own Star Wars fan fiction in Blender? Or just add a jaw-dropping space render to your portfolio?
Creating artistically pleasing space phenomena can be tricky. Quasars, gas giants, nebulae and black holes – these things can make you and your computer suffer…
NO LONGER!
After watching this video course you’ll be ready to create even the most complex space phenomena in Blender.
INSTRUCTORS
Aidy Burrows – Artist, Overly Optimistic, Lead Instructor at CGMasters.
Gleb Alexandrov – Caffeinated Artist, Founder of CreativeShrimp Website.
Full Disclosure: I Don’t Own This Course, but it has sold thousands of copies and people really rave about it. (It’s also now antiquated as it was pre-Blender 2.8)
CalArts – Game Design: Art & Concepts
Stemming from the principles of storytelling and design established in CalArts’ renowned Animation programs, this Specialization lays a primary foundation for experimentation and exploration of video game design, story, character development, and winning gameplay before programming begins. (Many Disney Animators over the years have come from CalArts) These four courses emphasize the self-reliance and personal expression of the gaming artist, and encourage you to take conceptual risks and develop new modes of expression and form through gaming. In the final Capstone Project, you’ll put your creative skills to work by generating an engaging game design document for a personal game project, outlining the conceptual, narrative and aesthetic elements of your game.
VFX: Complete Houdini Bootcamp
Houdini is an amazing software package for any type of hardcore VFX shot. It’s used industry-wide for some of the most impressive visuals you see in movies, tv, and commercials. Knowing this software will up your professional life if you work in 3D.
This is one of the best courses I’ve bought on Udemy. This instructor is solid. He has a slight accent but you get used to it very quickly. If you want to learn Houdini in a very simple and fun way, this course will up your skillset tenfold. He covers a whole lot but makes is easy to learn. Check it out.
Get UNITY Certified
This course from Unity Technologies comes direct from the developers of the Unity game engine. Learn everything you need to know as an artist to pass the certification test. Once certified, you may be privy to the best jobs and might be able to command a higher salary or rate. This is worth checking out if you want to work in Games, VR, AR, and many other interactive emerging fields. This is the future.
ESPORTS! University of California Irvine
The Esports Management Specialization prepares students to turn a passion for gaming into a viable career. According to a market report by Newzoo, global esports revenues have reached $906 million in 2018, a year-on-year growth of +38%. This is getting HUGE. Think “video gaming competitions in arenas.” Want to be a part of it? Check this out.
Complete Blender Creator
This is a bread and butter course in how to use Blender 3D. It covers modeling, texturing, shading, lighting, particles, destruction, and combining CG with real life. They are currently updating everything for 2.8.
Create Game Characters with Blender
Use Blender to 3D model, texture, rig, and animate your own game character. This course also shows you how to set up animation cycles and export them into Unity 3D for use in AR, VR, or Gaming.
How To Animate a Basic Shot
Learn from an animation supervisor how to animate a shot in the production of a feature film. This course is a bit newer and only has a handful of students, but receives high ratings. It’s worth checking out if you want to learn the animation workflow of a Feature Film, which can be a bid different than other types of animation.
Body Language in Character Animation
This course teaches you to understand the different gestures for cartoong characters and their projecting emotion. You will start developing intuition for better poses in your characters. This has over 3000 students enrolled with a score over 4 stars, which is pretty high. It’s worth a look if you want to gleam more gold nuggets for your animation skillset.
Character Art School
This is a pretty awesome drawing course. It boasts over 26 hours of instruction and covers things like drawing from your head, drawing in 3D, drawing faces, bodies, and hands, and how to draw characters for Games, Films, Animation, Manga, Comics and More. It gets a high rating and is worth checking out if you want to learn to draw OR learn different styles.
The Ultimate Guide to Game Development With Unity 2019
This is a bit more advanced, but if you want to develop games, this is a good one. It teaches you C# and solid game development principles. Even as an artist, this is good to understand as you can really grasp where your assets fit in and how to make them in a way that game devs will love.
The courses on this page are hand-picked and have high ratings. They mostly come from Udemy, which is a great site that gives you access to the instructor and other students on the site. This can help you learn with other like-minded learners in a supportive environment.
I urge you to check out these courses and really up your game. More will be added over time and this will be a solid resource to get information about new and exciting courses. You can certainly stick with the free route, but these can rocket you past where you are currently.
In full disclosure, some of these links are affiliate links, meaning that I get a couple of dollars if you buy. This money, while small, helps me run the site and associated Youtube channels. Thanks!