BA (Hons) Games Animation

On this course, you'll get the best of both worlds, learning technical skills and 3d modelling for games, together with the key principles of animation. So, whether you want to be an animator, a motion capture expert, or work in vfx, this course is ideal for you. 

Bring your designs to life, give them character through movement and expression, and learn the fundamentals of animation on our specialised BA (Hons) Games Animation degree at UCA Farnham.

This dedicated course allows you to really delve deep into the technical and creative elements of animation for video games, while offering in-depth training as a 3D artist and designer. With our extensive facilities, including motion capture technology and VR capabilities, you’ll be able to animate and develop expressive characters who move and show feeling just the way you want them to.  

Year 1
Launch Week 

• All launch weeks feature a range of activities, which will comprise an interdisciplinary Industry Guest Speakers’ Series offered to all students across the School of Games and Creative Technology.   
• There will also be other activities, such as study trips and/or studio visits, and o local, Design Sprints, could also take place. 

Principles of Animation

• At the heart of this modules are a series of practical hand-keyed animation challenges which will support you in developing your understanding of key animation principle, and the core skills necessary for the creation of 3D computer animation. You’ll also be introduced to the motion-capture process, and the key concepts and theories relevant to your practice as a games animator. 

Equality Diversity and Inclusion 

• The unit provides an opportunity for you to explore what is meant by equality, diversity, and inclusion and the implications of these concepts on your own creative practice. 

Board Games Design

• You’ll be asked to use the fundamental game design skills and knowledge you learned so far and apply them to paper-based design. Working in teams, you’ll prototype and build a board game. Final games will be presented as a group at the end of the unit, giving you a chance to build on your presentation and pitching skills, too.

Opportunity Week 

• Opportunity Week gives you the chance to try something a little different, broaden your engagement and your subject knowledge, such as Games Jams and Design Sprints. There may also be study trips and/or studio visits locally, in major hubs like London and even internationally for festivals, or trips museums, galleries and festivals. 

Technical Animation for Games 

• This has two core focuses – the first to explore the process of preparing modelled game assets for animation through the creation of animation control systems, and the second to explore the use of animation systems within game engines to create interactive animations.  

Client Brief

• You’ll be asked to use your skills and knowledge to work on a client-facing brief. You’ll work individually or in teams to respond, building your collaborative skills. And you’ll focus on refining your presentation skills to ensure outcomes are shared successfully. 

Interactive Narratives

• You’ll study popular frameworks and theoretical concepts such as designing a plot, character, setting, dialogue, culminating in making your own interactive narrative. You’ll investigate narrative as a psychological and anthropological phenomenon, before understanding its most contemporary and experimental forms embodied in postmodernism, and finally, games as narrative architectures for exploration. 

ATOM Activities

• ATOM activities are tiny pieces of diverse individual learning that facilitate interdisciplinary exposure and give you the chance to learn topics that would not otherwise be scheduled on your timetable. 

PLE Digital Outcome 1 

• Your PLE Digital Outcome is a purposefully edited, self-directed record of your constructive engagement with and presence on, digital media platforms across the year. Examples of this could be an online portfolio or blog/vlog, or social media activity. 

Year 2
Launch Week

• All launch weeks feature a range of activities, which will comprise an interdisciplinary Industry Guest Speakers’ Series offered to all students across the School of Games and Creative Technology.  
• There will also be other activities, such as study trips and/or studio visits, and o local, Design Sprints, could also take place.  

Character Animation for Games

• This units builds upon the foundational animation skills acquired in prior units and further develops them within the more complex field of character animation

Opportunity Week

• Opportunity Week gives you the chance to try something a little different, broaden your engagement and your subject knowledge, such as Games Jams and Design Sprints. There may also be study trips and/or studio visits locally, in major hubs like London and even internationally for festivals, or trips museums, galleries and festivals. 

Performance Animation

• You’ll will explore the key areas relevant to character animation for cut-scenes, such as lip sync and facial animation, as well as the use of reference footage to deliver an emotional performance.  

Industry Brief

• You’ll use your skills and workflows to produce work for an industry brief, who will set specific parameters and conditions to be met by a deadline. This could include style guides, historic markers, format conditions, audience, and genre. 
• You’ll work as individuals or in a team (depending on the brief) and develop new skills in engaging and communicating effectively with your fellow students, including your ability to respond to an industry focused brief. In addition, you will focus on refining your presentation skills to ensure that you successfully share the outcomes, reflecting on your output. 

ATOM Activities and PLE Digital Outcome

• These units are an extension of the Year 1 ATOM Activities and PLE Digital Outcome. 

Elective units

You’ll also be able to choose from two of the following elective units through the course of the year:

• Conceptual Interdisciplinary
• Immersive Media
• Digital Storytelling
• Hardware Projects using Arduino
• Virtual Production Studio
• Pervasive Game Studio
• Creature Animation
• Motion Capture Technologies
• Environmental Storytelling

Year 3
Launch Week

• All launch weeks feature a range of activities, which will comprise an interdisciplinary Industry Guest Speakers’ Series offered to all students across the School of Games and Creative Technology.  
• There will also be other activities, such as study trips and/or studio visits, and o local, Design Sprints, could also take place. 

Final Major Project: Pre-Production

• Your final year allows you to develop a significant body of work that demonstrates your chosen pathway discipline, ideation skills, genre interests and your aspiration for your future role within the Games and entertainment industries. Work from this period of study will make up and define your graduate portfolio. This unit is all about developing your project proposal through which you will define the concept, scope, audience, and purpose of your Final Major Project. 

Final Major Project: Critical and Conceptual Influences

• This unit consists of a period of sustained, individually negotiated research which will help you develop an appropriate methodological approach towards your Final Major Project. You’ll produce a written piece that reflects upon and articulates a clear and sustained argument. 

Professional Practice

• You’ll identify, explore and develop professional promotional resources that highlight your strengths and your body of work. This will help you define and present yourself in a professional manner to external parties, in line with the conventions of professional practice and the workplace.  

Final Major Project: Production

• The culmination of your studies, you’ll follow through with your agreed proposal to produce a body of work that demonstrates your creativity, skill, knowledge and understanding of recognised games industry practices and pipelines, to a professional standard. Work from this stage will make up your graduate portfolio.  
• You will take responsibility for your own development in anticipation of graduation and professional practice in the computer games industry, and you’ll be required to keep a development journal to document your technical skills and ideas, your process, and your ongoing critical evaluation and reflection. 

Study abroad (optional)

• This course is designed to offer you (if eligible) the opportunity to study part of your degree aboard at a UCA partner university, while still earning credits towards your UCA degree.

Industry placement offer

• Preparing graduates for successful careers underpins everything we do, and all students on this course may be offered support to identify and prepare for an industry placement according to their individual needs. We’ll draw on our wide range of contacts within the creative industries to help provide you with opportunities that align with your interests and future career aspirations.

Industry Links

• Our professional staff have close connections with alumni of the Gnomon School of Visual Effects, West Hollywood, as well as with new and established CG arts, animation and creative media opportunities.

Careers

Possible career destinations include:

• Art directors
• CG artists and animators for film and game
• Concept artists
• Creative project managers
• Creative writers
• Freelance creatives
• Post-production designers
• Pre-production artists
• Production artists
• Production managers.

Graduates have gone on to work at companies such as:

• Double Negative
• Framestore
• The Mill
• Glassworks
• Squint/Opera
• Butch Auntie.

Watch the interview with graduate Urvashi who after graduation worked in industry and then has also continued onto a postgraduate course at UCLA in America: Interview For UCA