All animation involves building up a series of images to create the illusion of movement. There are three main ways in which this is done and you could find yourself specialising in one method:

2D: Early Disney films used this old fashioned way of animating, where each image is hand drawn. The results can be fantastic, but this method is very slow. Nowadays, the work is made much faster by using computer software.

Stop-frame: Characters are built as real 3D models that are moved carefully by hand for each frame. Wallace and Gromit are the most famous examples of stop-frame animation.

3D Computer Animation: 3D models are built and animated within a computer program. It’s now possible to achieve astonishing realism and this method is the one used most commonly in games and films.
As an animator on a large project you would work from a storyboard to make a series of images that create the illusion of movement. This is a slow and repetitive job, but one in which creativity really matters.
On a smaller project, you could be involved in other areas of the process, such as the initial design of the characters, talking to clients, drawing up storyboards, painting models and editing the final film or video.