What You Need to Know to Be an Animator in Las Vegas, Nevada

The city of Las Vegas, Nevada, with as many as 130,000 commercial businesses and a gigantic entertainment industry, is home to hundreds of local artists seeking employment in animated film design.  Las Vegas supports an energetic ongoing demand for professionals in this field.

Las Vegas Schools and Training Programs for Animation

Las Vegas, Nevada colleges, Universities and training organizations offer various visual animation courses and degree programs.  Aspiring animators attending local design schools study visual arts, digital graphics, photography, communications design and many other relevant topics.  Renowned Las Vegas art schools with animation programs include Community College of Southern Nevada and University of Nevada, among others. 

Some Las Vegas artists earn animation skills and degrees via virtual art schools.  Popular accredited online colleges with animation degree programs include the Academy of Art University, Post University, Full Sail University, Stratford Career Institute, University of Phoenix, The Art Institutes and ITT Tech.  Several art colleges with online curricula also provide physical campuses.  University of Phoenix and ITT Tech both have locations in Las Vegas.

Working as an Animator in Las Vegas, Nevada

Loads of Las Vegas companies hire local animation artists.  Businesses that utilize animated film design include casinos, event planners, online news syndicates, advertisers, website designers, software developers, local government offices and many more.  Some Las Vegas animators work for local animation studios like Casino Arts or Rock-n-Toons.  Others partner up with local motion picture companies.  Leading Las Vegas film makers include Border Cross Productions, Griffin Entertainment, Photographic TV, Piccolo Productions and Trimordial Studios.  Other local animators work for graphics-oriented IT corporations.  Among the largest Las Vegas info tech firms are Aliante-Web-Design, Local-Scope-Marketing, Mazin-Web-Studio, Scriptnet and Web-Captain.

Professional animators in Las Vegas, Nevada average about $55,500 per year, with a mean hourly rate of roughly $27.00.  Animators employed in Las Vegas earn more, on average, than those employed in other parts of Nevada. 

Skills of a Professional Animator

In industries like medicine and law, animation is used to illustrate or explain complex technical ideas.  In the world of promotional advertising, animation is used to get your attention.  However, the most crucial element of most successful animated films is the masterful telling of a story.  Animators have this talent in addition to visual arts talents like advanced drawing technique and innovative digital design.  Other important skills are photography, model making, prototyping and set design, as well as web page construction, computer operating systems expertise and fluency in common computer programming languages like HTML.