Media Arts & Animation Degree Requirements

In order to be prepared to pursue your degree or diploma, there are a number of requirements we ask that you meet so you are ready to hit the ground running when it comes to your studies. The admissions requirements detail the prerequisites from an academic standpoint that have to be met. The technical requirements detail what you’ll need for your online learning experience.

Students seeking admission to The Art Institute of Pittsburgh — Online Division must meet the following requirements shown below.

The prospective student must be a high school graduate with a minimum, cumulative, final high school GPA of 2.0 or higher, or hold a General Education Development (GED) Certificate, or associate's degree or higher as a prerequisite for admission.

Online Orientation

Each student who enrolls at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh — Online Division is required to complete an online student orientation prior to the start date of the student's first course. The online orientation helps the student become familiar with different features of the online classroom environment and prepares the student for his or her role as an active learner in the online classroom.

Software Requirements

• Adobe Acrobat Professional
• Adobe Photoshop
• Adobe After Effects
• Adobe Dreamweaver
• Adobe Flash Professional
• Adobe Illustrator
• Adobe Premiere
• Autodesk Maya Unlimited
• Audacity 1.2.3
• Autodesk 3ds Max
• DigiCel Flipbook Studio
• Microsoft Office Professional
• Norton Antivirus
• Windows Media Player

Minimum Technology Requirements

• PC (only): As a general guideline, students should not have computer specifications less than a Pentium 4 CPU or AMD Athlon 64 processor and one of the following Operation Systems with 4GB of RAM and at least 10 GB of hard-disk space available for installation with at least a 1024x768 display (1280x800 recommended) with a qualified hardware-accelerated OpenGL graphic card, 16-bit color, and 256MB of VRAM, as a well as a DVD-ROM drive and one of the following operating systrems: 
  • Windows XP with Service Pack 3
  • Windows Vista Home Premium, Business, Ultimate, or Enterprise with Service Pack 1 (Service Pack 2 recommended)
  • Windows 7

Web Browser Requirements

PC: At least one of the following browsers with Java enabled:

• Internet Explorer 9.0 (recommended)
• Internet Explorer 8.0 (supported)
• Mozilla Firefox 4.0 (recommended)
• Mozilla Firefox 3.5 (supported)
• Google Chrome 5.0 and higher (supported

Hardware Requirements

• CD or DVD burner
• Color Inkjet Printer
• Color Flatbed Scanner
• Digital Camera

Purchase Computer Hardware and Software

Visit Journey Ed, America's leading seller of hardware and software to students. Select from a wide variety of software programs and purchase all of your required software online - at a student discount.