Hey there!
I'm on my third year of
BA (Hons) Animation at
Plymouth College of Art. I would definitely recommend doing an Animation degree, or some sort of paid online course. It is important to be properly taught how to work to industry standards, as well as learning other parts of the animation pipeline so that you have a comprehensive understanding of the animation process from start to finish. It seems like you would be looking to specialise in background design, which is something that you can 100% do within an Animation course. You can specialise in any part of the animation pipeline; it doesn't have to be character animation! If you're stuck between 2D and 3D, then I recommend doing either a degree or an online course because creating 2D and 3D backgrounds are two VERY different practices. 2D background design works with software such as ToonBoom, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop etc and requires skills in drawing, colouring, etc. 3D backgrounds are much more technical and one background is normally made by a couple of different people. It begins with modelling (which means everything is grey), which is a specialism in itself. Then it requires texturing and UV wrapping, which is again another technique. The final look of the background won't be achieved until it is rendered, which is yet another technique to learn. As you can see there is a big difference between 2D and 3D backgrounds!
The first year of a three year animation degree is there to allow you to experiment and explore lots of different areas and practices within animation, so you would be able to work out whether you'd prefer to go into 2D background design or 3D modelling. You can also develop your skills in concept art and storyboarding, with the option to specialise in it if you wish to
I started off wanting to specialise in background design/concept art too, as I was also drawn to the background details rather than the characters. Whilst I still love doing backgrounds now, I have decided to specialise in 2D deformation rigged character animation
I hope this helps and please feel free to reach out to me again through here or through
UniBuddy and I would be more than happy to talk to you more about studying Animation.
Lauren
Third Year Animation Student and Student Ambassador