Explore the world of 2D Animation as a fulfilling career path that allows for creative expression, continuous skill development, and diverse opportunities. While the industry is shifting towards 3D animation, there is still a demand for 2D animators, especially those who are willing to expand their training and specialization.

Key Insights

  • 2D Animators are creative professionals involved in designing two-dimensional animated assets for various industries - from traditional animation and video games to digital advertising and user interfaces.
  • As the industry modernizes, most 2D animation work is now computer-assisted, requiring knowledge of computer design applications like Adobe After Effects, Premiere Pro, Illustrator and Photoshop.
  • 2D Animators average an annual salary of about $62,000, and with more expertise, salaries can go up to $100,000 or even higher with 3D animation skills.
  • 2D animation is a great field for those seeking a creative career, and it offers opportunities for freelancers to establish their unique creative voice.
  • Learning 2D animation can open doors to high-paying careers in growing industries like film, television, and consumer software.
  • Noble Desktop provides a range of 2D animation classes that cover technical training and offer career support options including one-on-one mentoring for career certificate programs.

2D animation is a wonderful career path if you are looking for a job that allows you to express yourself creatively, continuously develop your creative skills, and open the door to diverse career opportunities for professionals willing to expand their training. It is worth noting that 2D animation as a specialty has been contracting over the years as studios move away from traditional animation in favor of computer animation, meaning that 3D animation is becoming more of an industry-standard practice. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t jobs available for 2D Animators. Still, it is worth considering that you may need additional training and specialization if you are angling for the highest-paying jobs in the industry.

What is a 2D Animator?

2D Animators are creative professionals who plan, design, and build two-dimensional animated assets in everything from traditional animation and video games to digital advertising and user interfaces. As long as a digital asset is made to move, it is likely that a 2D Animator was involved in the process. 2D Animators may also be involved in the development, design, planning, or storyboarding phases of a given project, depending on their level of expertise and the kind of project in question. On the whole, 2D animation is a versatile skill used in various industries and fields, making it an ideal career path for anyone interested in a creative career.

In today’s world, unless a project consciously uses the unique affordances of hand-drawn animation, almost all 2D animation work is computer-assisted. This shift means most animators have begun using computer design applications such as Adobe After Effects or Premiere Pro to add the illusion of motion to a set of static images. 2D Animators may also use tools like Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop to construct certain kinds of specific animated assets, such as moving digital logos or online GIFs. This emphasis on digitally aided animation tools means that your training as a 2D Animator will cover a lot of technical training.

Read more about what a 2D Animator does. 

2D Animator Salary and Job Outlook

2D Animators command an average salary of approximately $62,000 a year, which is higher than the national average. 2D Animators starting salaries tend to be slightly lower than this, but they still generally hover in the mid-50,000s depending on the firm you are hired into and where you work. In terms of long-term earning potential, 2D Animators can command salaries of upwards of $100,000 dollars a year for creatives working in high-end management roles. However, in most cases, the highest paying jobs in the field are reserved for animators with a more robust skillset, particularly those with 3D animation training.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of animation and special effects jobs (the broad category of jobs under which 2D Animator falls) is set to expand by about 5% over the next decade. This is in line with the expected job growth across all industries, but is an outlier in terms of art and design jobs, which are only expected to grow by about 2%. If you are interested in a creative career, 2D animation might be a path worth considering, since the job outlook in this field is slightly rosier than the rest of the professional art field. 

Read more about 2D Animator salaries and the job outlook for a 2D Animator.

What Makes 2D Animation a Good Career?

Opportunity to Flex your Creative Voice

2D Animators are almost universally drawn to the field because it allows them to express themselves creatively. Despite the emphasis on computer technology and design applications, 2D animation is still very much a field that requires employees to think creatively and transform ideas into reality. This has been true since the age of hand-drawn animation cels and is unlikely to change in the future, meaning that 2D animation is a great career field for anyone looking to make their creative passions into their career. It is also a field where experience and dedication are rewarded with ever-increasing opportunities to steer the ship of a studio project since the most traditional career path for 2D Animators sees animators becoming more and more involved in the concept, pre-production, and approval stages of animation projects.

2D Animation is also a great career for freelancers hoping to sell companies and contractors on the value of their particular voice. Rather than working in a studio where you are expected to be a cog in a machine for the early part of your career, you’ll be able to attract clientele who want your specific design sensibilities and talents applied to their projects. This can be a challenging prospect at the start of your career, but it can pay long-term dividends if you want to start your own animation business or establish the value of your own creative voice in your job materials

Work on Exciting Projects

Animation is a historically significant art form, and for many animators, it has been an important part of their lives and cultural upbringing. One of the reasons that many 2D Animators enter into the career field is the prospect of being able to one day work on the kinds of projects that inspired them to become animators. Working at a major animation studio, a large-scale game design firm, or even a massive software development project is the ultimate goal for many animators. It is very much a real possibility for those willing to put their time into the industry. While this can involve working on mundane projects to gain the necessary experience, for many animators, the prospect of one day getting to work on an Oscar-winning animated film or an industry-defining software development project is well worth the effort.

In addition, once you have enough experience or established yourself as a freelancer, you may even be able to guide the kinds of projects you work on. Animators play a key role in the pre-production and planning stages of multi-million dollar projects, and even freelancers can get their ideas noticed with a good amount of time and effort. Most creatives have stories they want to tell, and working in 2D animation is a good way to build the networks and connections required to make those dreams a reality.

Opens the Door to High-Paying Careers

2D Animation is a wide-open career path that offers individuals several opportunities to find high-paying, in-demand employment in various industries. 2D Animators can work their way up a studio system ladder to take greater agency and autonomy in their work, and they can begin managing and overseeing elements of the animation process. For example, a 2D Animator could find work as a Lead Animator, overseeing a team of animators working on an element of a project or, eventually, work as a Senior Lead Animator who oversees the work of the Lead Animators and essentially run the animation side of any given project, working closely with directors, product managers, actors, or editors, depending on the kind of work. Eventually, an Animator could become a Chief Creative Officer (or several similar job titles that vary between industries). These CCOs are tasked with guiding the creative direction of a studio, firm or company and they are given a significant amount of control since they are hired to lead the creative process. Salaries for CCOs vary greatly, but most earn over $200,000 a year.

2D Animators who want to expand on their skills can train to become 3D Animators which will significantly increase their job opportunities and long-term earning potential. The career path for a 3D Animator is often much the same as that of a 2D Animator, but 3D Animators are slightly more in-demand as more and more entertainment and software companies produce 3D animated assets for their products, relative to the amount of 2D animation they employ.

Work in Growing Industries

2D animation is most commonly associated with the film and television industry and the consumer software industry. Both of these industries are expanding relatively consistently as consumers spend more and more to purchase digital software-enabled products and entertainment services. Learning 2D animation is an excellent way to apply your creative skills to either of these industries, since both industries regularly bring animators onto new projects. Long-term career outlooks are solid for 2D Animators in these industries and they are likely to continue growing alongside the other jobs within those industries. So long as the entertainment and software industries continue to grow, so too shall the demand for 2D Animators to work in those industries.

Career Paths Related to 2D Animator

One of the advantages to learning 2D animation is that the fundamental skills involved in creating 2D animated assets translate well into other career paths. Depending on the kinds of training you receive and the kinds of projects you enjoy working on, there are a lot of different routes you can take to expand your career options as a 2D Animator.

Some 2D Animators specialize in designing animated assets for specific platforms or media. These career paths include Visual Designers, Game Designers, and Key Animators. Each of these career paths takes your existing 2D animation skills and applies them to a platform, so Visual Designers will create animations for user interfaces or digital applications. In contrast, Game Designers will create 2D animated assets for video games or mobile games.

Other 2D Animators will learn complementary skills that utilize and build upon their 2D animation training. The most common career paths associated with this additional training regiment are 3D Animators, Visual Artists, and Video Editors. 3D Animators, as the name suggests, work with three-dimensional digitally animated assets, and they, like 2D Animators, can work on a wide variety of projects. Visual Effects Artists work on film, television, and online video production to build the elaborate animated effects that we associated with SFX and other on-screen animation, like MoCap and ChromaKey animation. Video Editors do the more technical work of adding those visual effects to a completed video project and are tasked with other responsibilities, such as ensuring sound quality, maintaining continuity, and controlling the pace and structure of an edit.

Finally, many 2D Animators remain in the field but learn the project management skills necessary to work in a managerial capacity. These professionals will learn generalized project management skills, such as time and resource management and human resource skills, and they may learn specialized skills that complement their animation background. For example, these animators may learn how to draw and design storyboards to map out a project before it is handed off to animators, and they may learn basic screenwriting and editing techniques so that they can work more closely with creatives in other departments who are also working on specialized aspects of the project.

Read more about other career paths related to 2D Animator careers.

Learn the Skills to Become a 2D Animator at Noble Desktop

Once you’ve committed to learning the skills necessary to become a 2D Animator, Noble Desktop is available to make that dream a reality through professional skills instruction. Noble offers a wide array of 2D animation classes, available in person or online, and all of these classes are taught by expert instructors with years of on-the-job experience. This structure means that regardless of how your course is delivered, you’ll receive real-time instruction and be able to ask questions and receive personalized feedback on your work. Similarly, no matter whether you take the course in person or online, you’ll benefit from small class sizes and all of the professionalization support options, including one-on-one career mentoring in the career-certificate programs. Finally, every Noble class comes with the option for a free retake within one year, meaning that you’ll have the chance to build your portfolio and get even more hands-on experience in preparation for entering the job market.

Students interested in a career change may consider enrolling in Noble’s Motion Graphics Certificate program. This class aims to teach students how to use tools like Adobe After Effects and Premiere Pro to create evocative 2D and 3D animated assets for many practical projects. In this class, students will be guided through the process of using After Effects to animate text, photos, and videos, and they will learn how to modify these animations in subtle but perceptible ways slightly. Students will also learn how to create animated images using layered Photoshop and Illustrator files (this course does not include instruction in either of these tools, they are prerequisites for taking the course). Finally, students will learn how to use Premiere Pro to edit their animated assets into video files. All this work will culminate in a series of professionalization seminars, including a portfolio-building workshop and a one-on-one mentorship session, intended to prepare students for a career as a 2D or 3D Animator.

Students who aren’t ready to make a significant career shift but do want to learn 2D animation skills may want to consider one of Noble’s many motion graphics bootcamps. These classes include the Adobe After Effects Bootcamp, which provides students with guided instruction in the use of After Effects for creating animated digital assets and the Adobe Premiere Pro Bootcamp, which teaches students how to use that program to compile their animated assets into a completed project. These courses are excellent starting points for new animators looking to learn the trade. However, they don’t provide students with any of the professionalization services offered through Noble’s career certificate programs.

Finally, students who aren’t sure that they want to start learning 2D animation but are intrigued by the possibility should consult some of Noble’s free training resources to learn more. Noble’s Learn 2D Animation page, as well as their Learn After Effects and Learn Premiere Pro page compiles a weird range of articles, free seminars and resources that students can use to help them on their 2D Animation career path. Noble also provides prospective 2D Animators with a career information hub to help them decide if a career change is right for them.

Key Takeaways

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