Quote - If you want to be a CG artist, go buy the expensive tools, enroll at Full Sail, and stop using other people's content.

 

No, don't go to Full Sail. LOL. Trust me. Unless you enjoy having insane amounts of student debt that you'll likely never be able to pay off, (and could possibly lose your property over and have your pay and social security garnished for life), or you're independently wealthy and have nothing better to do with your money. An animation degree at Full Sail is about $130K before interest and other expenses. That's if they don't find ways to screw you into paying twice for some of your classes - and they will try. The median annual salary for CG artists today is 45 to 55K. Senior artists is a bit higher. That's for years where you remain continuously employed. Most studios don't keep the bulk of a team beyond the end of a project, so the turn-over rate is huge and you're pretty much always looking for another job. And even fewer studios are seriously hiring anymore, since a lot of them have started outsourcing work to India and other places for pennies on the dollar. But you're not going to hear those details from your "student advisor" which is nothing more than a salesman that's being paid to tell you whatever you need to hear to sign the paperwork. 

There's nothing Full Sail (or any other animation school for that matter), can teach you that you can't learn by yourself with enough practice and dedication and research - which the internet is packed full of. You don't need a degree in animation to get work in the industry. Most places don't even ask for one. Just a lot of patience and hard work and the ability to demonstrate that you know what you're doing. 

There's some benefits for going to school for it, (most being industry connections for the very best students) but no school will teach you skill, that has to come from yourself. 

As for snobbery, most of it is just because people enjoy being assholes. Especially younger people these days. It's almost like a contest to see who can be a bigger dick online. Some of it is because the content used in Poser is rarely made by the Poser user who rendered it, while in the higher end apps, most of that content is created by the person who rendered it, from base model to finished textures and lighting. Weeks and months if not more, can go into one still image, from one artist using whatever high-priced app they're using (which they likely pirated anyway). The rest of it is just hot air and false ego. 

As long as you put evertying you've got into it, the only thing that matters is the end result, not what software you used to get there. Software only matters when you're trying to get a job in the industry. 

 

~Shane