Reddit mentions of Introducing Autodesk Maya 2015: Autodesk Official Press

First let me say, congratulations on finding this wonderful amazing industry. I casually stumbled into animation by taking a 3D animation class in college on a whim and I loved it ever since, however I have only gotten really serious (like life/educational commitment to it) about six months ago.

If you are a total 100% absolute beginner start with The Animators Survival Guide, and I would also recommend The Illusion of Life. These two books are amazing resources almost every animator should know.

Now I know this sub has a pretty good split of 2D and 3D animators so you gotta decide which you want to be, to most people this is a pretty clear and obvious choice.

Now all of this is specific to 3D animation from hence forth BUT that said much of it translates into a 2D environment.

Here is the next big key question, what kind of animator are you, feature, game, freelance, or just hobbyist? Some might scoff and say "Well whats the difference" and I thought so too so let me break down the difference for you.

Feature:

These are the animators working on the Incredible 2, Moana, Shrek's etc of the world. Feature animation is all about getting real emotions into characters and truly giving them the illusion of life. This educational track focuses heavily on proper posing, staging, and appeal. These animators also almost always "work to the camera" which means that the camera angel of the shot is chosen for you, this is great because it allows us to use the motto "If it looks right it is right." Animating to the camera is a blessing and a curse because you must carefully select your characters motions and think about how limbs will be obstructed in a shot so you need to think around that. However this can be a good thing, one of my mentors worked on the fantastic movie Coco and she worked on one particular shot where the main character is swimming in a big pool. Now during this shot the main characters feet actually clip through the bottom of the pool and go through the object several times, but because she was animating to the camera she did not have to worry about this at all.

Game:

I admit this is the one I have the least experience with, basically a game animator focuses on loops more than anything else. You are working on walk cycles, jump cycles, gun fire cycles, reloads etc. The real trick with game animation is that not only do you have to get the animation looking right you have to get it FEELING right. You have to make your animation have proper timing and appeal through out the whole thing to give the character personality. Game animators also really come into the problem of their animation having to look right from EVERY angle.

Freelancers:

I have personally never freelanced but I know from a few friends that have the work that you do is all over the place. Some have done everything from working on small to mid sized indie games, to making Youtube intro's, to making company advertising materials. You really need to be a well rounded type of animator for this. Many animators do not freelance to start but it is not impossible

Wow so that was kind of lot of information huh..... Well where the hell do you go from here. Well there are a few avenues but some things are set in stone

1. You need to find out what program your section of animation is using and get intimately familiar with it, like I'm talking second life partner familiar. For 3D animation this is going to be Autodesk Maya, for a 2D animator I am not entirly sure.
   
   If you are a student you can get a free license for Maya through Autodesks student site, it really is an amazing program which every 3D animator will probably learn in their course of education.
   
   The book I can personally recommend for this is Introducing: Autodesk Maya 2015, while I know it might seem like the book is all over the place I recommend you have at least a basic understand of all the concepts the book covers. I know there are newer version of this book for the newer versions of Maya that are out but I have no personal experience with them
   
   
2. Read The Animators Survival Guide, cover to cover, and then do it again, and once again for good measure, and then if you are bored maybe browse it again.
   
   This book really is an amazing resource, paired with The Illusion of Life you basically have an animation master class printed in your lap
   
   
3. If you are serious about formal education investigate universities or vocational schools for it. I am personally a bit anti-university but that's due to my old universities film program and art programs being horribly mismanaged to the point of myself dropping out.
   
   I can personally recommend Animation Mentor which is an online vocational school of sort for 3D animators. I am currently int he first class in it and in the first 8 weeks of the class I have learned far more than I ever did over the course of four formal classes at my university (again your university might be UCLA and have great animation programs, your millage might vary)
   
   I am sure there's a million things I didn't cover in this post and if you have any questions at all please feel free to ask them and I will do my best to answer them!