Congrats on your getting ready for college. I happened to be quite knowledgeable on that subject actually. I've been looking at colleges since the beginning of freshman year (I'm a sophomore). Also, since the beginning of this year I have been researching much on the matter of portfolios and how to apply to an art college, so I'll give you a few pointers that I have encountered MANY MANY times, so it would be very wise to follow them.


Number One.
Portfolio Junks...
-Lots of observational, perhaps 4 to 5 peices of your best observational work, because that is one of the main things they will look for.
-Variety, try to get as big of a variety as you can for an art college, but beware, when you want to apply for a job afterwards you're probably going to want to make a portfolio for what THEY will be looking for. By variety I mean in mediums and styles, so have a digital piece, with an oil painting, acrylic, watercolor, colored pencils, pastels, pencils, charcoal. That kind of stuff. But not only that, MAKE SURE no two pieces have the same composition. You want to have a variety in style as well. Have your main style, sort of anime-esqe, have a fantasy, have realism, maybe things like impressionism and possibly even a sketch or two in there. make sure its a very clean, well planed sketch. Have a variety from Major perspective, to not as much. A lot of contrast, to not as much again. From warm colors to cool colors etc..
-Not too much work. The ideal amount is probably in the range of 14-16ish, but doesn't have to be that, you could probably get away with 12-20 pieces if you want to. But you want to make it as easy as possible for the admissions peeps. They have to go through tons and tons all the time, and they don't want to go through too much
-This is hard, but important. Try to get your work to stand OUT from other peoples. Like i said the admissions councilors go through tons of these, and will get bored of the same stuff over and over again, they want something that pops out at them.
-Another thing to think about, is submitting it for a scholarship. To be honest, from what I've seen and heard, it's not that hard to get into an art school. They accept people who are not outstanding because they're here to teach. And I can guarantee you will get into whatever art school you choose to go to. Unless it's RISD, AI, or Ringling, those ones are harder to get into. They also cost a lot too.




Number Two.
Your essay, woo fun!
You're going to have to right an essay whether you like it or not, and it's going to have to be a good one. Almost all essays are going to be based around what you would like to accomplish with your art, and why you think you should go to this particular college. Yes, mentioning this again, the admissions councilors go through a lot, so one, don't make it too long, usually its supposed to be 1-3 paragraphs. And two, make it GOOD, give them a really really good reason why you should go to the art school compared to the hundreds of others that apply.




Number Three.
Resume! YAY!
-Yes, the all powerful resume. You're going to want some nice accomplishments, but don't name too many. Also, make this as organized as you can get it. The People looking at this will want to find what they want right away. Some colleges ask for a resume, and others just have a bunch of essay questions about what you've done. Both are equivalent in the long run. Organize your thoughts so you know what you're going to put on either one.
-Pretty much part of your resume, Recommendation letters. They are very important to have, and maybe get a bunch of teachers to do this for you. BUT, I repeat, BUT! Do not use all of them, pick out the ones that are most convincing to what a wonderful student and person you are, and how amazing you are. You or only going to want like 2. At the max, and I mean the MAX, you might be able to pull off 3. But I don't know if its worth the risk. People try to pull of saying how awesome they are by putting those extra recommendation letters in. Don't be one of those people, that is frowned upon.







Welll.... That was fun! If you have any other questions, I might be able to answer them, and if I cant myself, I have my sources! Oh yes. And the college you choose to go to, it doesn't matter which it is, they pretty much teach the same concepts. Its how much YOU want to teach YOURSELF. If someone went to a terrible budget school and trained as hard as they good, they would end up blowing away someone who went to RISD or like, Germany for art college, and only did the bare minimum. Its not the college really, its where you want to go for college based on your needs and desires. Maybe one has a program you like more, or more painting classes, and you want as many painting classes as you can get. Choose that way, not by accreditation.

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Have wisdom? Give some to me, I would greatly enjoy your knowledge.

thank you so much for your information ^^ It really means a lot to me.

I'll definitely give the portfolio advice some thought, but I'm getting some contrasting info from my art teacher. He says I don't want to be all over the place (i.e. really ranged) but rather want to show a focused, progressive growth in certain areas (I'll be submitting a variety of styles though, i.e photos vs. digital paintings vs. cells vs. some blacka dn white traditional design work).

I'm still really nervous about my art and getting in though. USC is like top notch for animation so I'm really afraid my art will get turned down. I don't really know how to make my work unique, because my work is me and I can't change that. I'm trying to do some more realism and composition practice to throw on in the later parts of my portfolio, but I'm realizing now I should have probably started this sooner. I just get really torn between my love of studies and my love of art...

thanks again though ^^ I'm sure I'll figure things out, but this definitely helps.

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<sub>I less than three you.

This city never wakes.</sub>

just make something colorful and contrasting, and then they'll be like WHOA when they look at it. Your art teacher may know more than I do, but my information is from several graduated art students. Maybe to be completely all over the place, so you can show some consistency. But don't have your observational, then all digital paintings.

It also helps to talk to people affiliated with the school and alumni. Also, Don't stick to only USC. Especially because USC is a university, and will look at grades and test scores equally to someone who is going to major in like post-modern philosophy or something else that sounds really smart. But then another good thing about that, is it costs less, and theres other opportunities for scholarships as well. I'd look into other art schools though.

Like theres a time based media degree in MIAD, that is if you don't mind Milwaukee, because I'm not too fond of it, it has its good parts, but I'd be to scared to live there. Even though I'm going to apply there...

Then theres academies like flashpoint for media arts. Theres other places like California College of the Arts. And MCAD has a film major, and a masters program. Theres a ton of options to choose from. And also, its like a must to apply for more than one college.

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Have wisdom? Give some to me, I would greatly enjoy your knowledge.

first of all, let me laugh really hard at a university being cheaper. tuition to USC is $35000 a year, not counting books or room and board. I'm going to try and go on an academic scholarship

now that I'm done.... lol

I actually really want to go to a university over an art academy because the university does have the academics. I want to double major in some sort of engineering and possibly pursue a few courses in history and literature. I'm a really academic person (I'm 4th in my class and yada yada) so I don't really worry about getting into a university...but trying to find both art and academics is really hard. I know I need to find more art school options, but...I have yet to find any other schools that are really strong in both.

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<sub>I less than three you.

This city never wakes.</sub>

I'll give you this information that might help. This was written by Jason Manley of Conceptart.org, he is an amazing artist, heres a few samples of his work...
[link]

And here are his words of wisdom.

"1. Where you choose to go to art school is less important than bringing an attitude of "doing whatever it takes" to learn about art to where you are studying.

2. If you go to a big name school and just do the assignments, you will leave school with very little of value.

3. If you go to a little bitty school that anyone could afford and no one ever heard of but work your ass off, you will end up miles ahead of the brats at the art schools who are only doing their assignments and the normal minimal workload art schools require.

4. The schools will not hand feed you the information. You will have to take it from them. If one instructor doesnt know the answers, go find another one and get the answers from them. My best biz advice came from my illustration teacher and from the teacher who helped me to learn color theory. You never know who will have the answers...but you must push to find the questions that need to be asked. Dont expect it to be given to you with a silver spoon. It does not work that way.

5. What you do outside of school (outside of the student assignments and on top of the student assignments) is what will get you where you need to be. After school you will work four times harder than you did in art school so you might as well pick up the pace your freshman year and push as hard as you can.


6. One does not have to spend 100,000 dollars (which is what most end up spending after their loans are paid off) in order to get a great education.

7. 95 percent of what can be found at the big art schools can be found at the state and community college level and the other five percent (specific connections and work experience) can be found in places like conceptart.org (see employment section) and cgsociety amongst others. Of course one's major area of study will dictate where they must go to find the information. If any information is lacking from the less expensive education route it can be supplimented with great programs like the Illustration Academy and or the ConceptArt.Org workshops.

8. Degrees mean jack squat to an artist unless they plan on working overseas (required for the visa) or teaching full time at the university level. No one in my entire career has ever asked if I graduated from college. I didn't...but I did do six successive years in art school. I did not even graduate from high school. Now I own two international art companies which lead in their respective fields. However, my education was valuable. But, one can be educated away from a degree system and end up just fine. Degrees in art are mostly for pleasing your parents.

9. Art school is a blast. Don't let it distract you from being as great as you can be. Becoming a professional artist takes nose to the grindstone work. Art school can distract from that (oh it is so tempting to go to those all night parties where all sorts of debauchery is happening) but limit yourself there...if you are going to art school..spend the time doing art.

10. Art school recruiters will say anything they think you want to hear in order to get you to go. The best way to find out the truth about where you are going to study is to visit the school.

11. Ask to see the faculty work of those whom you will study under. If you blindly attend because of reputation you may find that you have instructors who cannot do anything of the sort that you wish to learn yourself. ie if your instructor is a fine artist who makes everything out of balls of rice, you are going to have a very hard time learning composition and color theory from them. Find out who you are studying under before you spend six figures on an education...that even applies to the more affordable solutions at the state or community level."

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Have wisdom? Give some to me, I would greatly enjoy your knowledge.

I wanna see pictures from prom! I'll send you pictures of mine when it comes!

Your dress sounds so pretty.
I have a black, strapless velvet floor length gown and black elbow length gloves. Jake's gonna be down here too so we get to go together, I'm so excited.

We need to start writing again!

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Wait....Can I be a Superhero and a Supervillain?

oooo neat! yeah I'll have to send them to you (once I get my camera) note me your email, and while you're at it, your address! I'll write you. I miss sending letters XD

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<sub>I less than three you.

This city never wakes.</sub>