Love video games, movies, and the Web? If so, media arts schools can help prepare you for a career in which you become the creator. Studying media arts begins with learning the fundamentals of design, art, and animation, and then applying this knowledge in a hands-on way in courses like 3-D modeling, animation (and motion capture), texture & lighting, and compositing.

Does media arts training sound like the type of study about which you can be passionate?Sure, it's exciting, but when you consider the variety of exciting media arts careers that degrees from media arts schools can offer, you'll realize that there's a lot of potential for growth as well.

According to the Occupational Outlook Handbook, media arts professionals work primarily in motion picture and video industries, specialized design services, gaming, and computer systems design services. Whether it's designing the next hot video game, creating visual effects for film and television, and working on any of the emerging applications for 3D such as scientific and medical visualization, it's all in a day's work for those with media arts training.

Basic skills include the ability to draw by hand and use computers to create the large series of pictures that form the animated images or special effects seen in movies, television programs, and computer games. Some draw storyboards for television commercials, movies, and animated features.

Although the skills learned at media arts schools often allow artists to work on freelance projects and commissions, it's refreshing to know that the median annual earnings of salaried multimedia artists and animators were $56,330 in 2008, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $100,390. Median annual earnings were $65,600 in motion picture and video industries.

Intrigued? If so, start researching media arts schools now to design your future within media arts careers.

Program outcomes vary according to each institution's specific program curriculum and employment opportunities are not guaranteed.