India’s Top 10 Animation Design Institutes 2013

With a 30 percent annual growth rate, this new age industry’s revenue is expected to exceed $1,623 million (Rs.9,738 crore) by 2015, provoking leap-frogging demand for trained animators. Here are India’s Top 10 Animation Design Institutes for the year 2013:

Of the several new age professional education vocations featured in this inaugural EW-C fore survey, animation is the most hot and happening. Unknown three decades ago, animations are now a vital feature of computerised games, video technology, the internet, advertising and feature films. And silently against all odds, India has emerged as a new outsourcing hub for animation design with Hollywood studios such as Walt Disney, Warner brothers and Sony routinely outsourcing animations and special effects to Indian companies. The annual income of the global animations industry is projected to top $100 billion by end 2013. Of that, the Indian animations industry is expected to gross $961 million (Rs.5,789 crore). With a 30 percent annual growth rate, this new industry’s revenue is expected to exceed $1,623 million by 2015, provoking leap-frogging demand for animators.

To meet this growing requirement for trained animation professionals, several private computer training institutes are offering short-term diploma programmes. However, given that the discipline is still in its infancy and continuously evolving with advances in internet and media technologies, the great majority of institutes lack well-developed curriculums, infrastructure, and quality faculty. Which is why in the inaugural EducationWorld-C fore Animation Institutes 2013 Rankings, the league table has been restricted to the Top 10 which offer high-quality, full-fledged undergraduate, postgraduate and diploma programmes.

Topping the league table of India’s most respected animation education institutes with an aggregate score of 585 of 650 is DSK Supinfocom, Pune, also ranked #1 on all four parameters — faculty competence, infrastructure, pedagogic systems, and placements. Promoted in 2008, DSK Supinfocom is a joint venture between the DSK Group (annual sales revenue: Rs.4,000 crore), a Pune-based heavyweight with interests in real estate, automobiles, education, pharmaceuticals, hospitality and infrastructure, and the France-based Supinfocom, a top-ranked computer graphics university with campuses in Valenciennes and Arles. Supinfocom is a constituent institution of the Supinfocom Group promoted by the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Grand Hainaut, a public institution representing industry in northern France.

Spread over a state-of-the-art 20-acre campus in the Pune suburb of Fursungi, DSK Supinfocom offers a five-year degree programme in animation, game and industrial design to Plus Two students, with graduates/diploma hold-ers allowed lateral entry into the third/fourth year. From 48 students in 2008, enrolment at the institute has grown to 450 students instructed by 20 full-time faculty. “We are delighted that your informed respondents have ranked DSK Supinfocom India’s #1 animation institute. It’s an endorsement of our comprehensive ecosystem — excellent infrastructure, international faculty, hands-on curriculum, learning though live projects and internships. Our academic alliance with Supinfocom distinguishes us and enables us to offer a world-class curriculum and international faculty from France and other western countries,” says Ninad Panse, chief executive officer of DSK Supinfocom, who adds that the institute’s graduates are readily snapped up by leading studios in the US and Europe.

A residential institution offering contemporary hostel facilities, the DSK Supinfocom campus boasts superbly equipped computer labs with latest production software, digital editing studios, indoor and outdoor games facilities, a swimming pool and cafeteria. Tuition fee: Rs.7 lakh per year.

Ranked #2 among the country’s best animation institutes is the pioneer National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad (estb. 1962) which offers class XII school-leavers a five-year study programme with specialisations in graphics, animation film design or video programming. Weighing in at #3 is the Image College of Arts, Animation & Technology (ICAT), Chennai. After promising our Chennai-based correspondent Hemalatha Raghupathi an interview, the ICAT management went incommunicado and failed to respond to telephone calls and e-mails.

On the other hand, the top brass of Whistling Woods International Institute for Film, Communication, Animation and Media Arts, Mumbai — ranked #7 — was thrilled to be voted among the Top 10 animation institutes countrywide. Promoted in 2006 as a division of Bollywood director Subhash Ghai’s feature films company Mukta Arts Ltd, and spread over 20 acres in Mumbai’s Filmcity, Goregaon, Whistling Woods International (WWI) offers its 450 students animation, technical and film-making training in state-of-the-art digital studios fitted with latest recording and editing equipment and a 250-seat digital surround sound cinema. Currently WWI’s school of animation offers a three-year B.Sc programme in digital film making (through an affiliation with Bharathidasan University, Coimbatore), as also a diploma programme in special effects to 40 students.

“Since 2006, WWI has been consistently working towards the goal of providing students world-class education to prepare them for well-paid careers in the media and entertainment industry. An indicator of our success is that Hollywood Reporter ranked WWI among the Top 10 film schools in the world in 2010. Whistling Woods’ professionalism is the result of excellent infrastructure, an integrated curriculum, faculty comprising working professionals, and strong links with the media and entertainment industry. Our industry links programme has ensured ready demand for our graduates in top companies and studios such as Big Animation, Realtime Entertainment Studios, Dreamworks Animation, among others,” says Chaitanya Chinchlikar, the Mumbai-based vice president (business development) and chief technology officer of WWI.

The Top 10 league table of India’s best animation institutes is completed by the Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics (MAAC), Andheri, Mumbai (# 8), Arena Multimedia, South Extension, Delhi (# 9) and Arena Multimedia, Dilsukhnagar, Hyderabad (#10) — schools promoted by Aptech Computer Education Pvt. Ltd.

To see Top 10 league table visit http://www.educationworld.in/rank-animation/2013.html