Art Institute of Calif.-San Diego Adds Tech Art Degree

The Art Institute of California-San Diego has said it is adding a new bachelor’s degree program for technical artists who want to work in the game industry or animation. The degree will be in Visual & Game Programming The new curriculum is designed to give students a foundational education in both art and design, then help them advance into more technical areas of programming for 3D animation. In the game industry, “technical artist” is one of the job titles that’s most in demand in the art discipline. And because technical artists are so hard to find, they’re often compensated fairly well. The new program, say officials at the Art Institute, will prepare graduates for entry-level positions as technical artists, technical developers, assistant technical directors, and 3D tools programmers. According to a press release, the curriculum was developed with input from the game and animation industries. Much of the coursework will focus on teaching students to write, extend, and modify programs and scripts for 3D animation. They will also learn principles of programming as well as some scripting tools, such as Perl, C++, C-shell, MEL scripting, MAXScript, DirectX, and OpenGL. Enrollment for the bachelor’s degree program in Visual & Game Programming for the fall 2008 quarter is open now. Visit www.artinstitutes.edu/sandiego for more information.