Ok so basically i'll be starting a 2D animation project next week and I was wondering if any of you could possibly give me any pointers on hand drawn animations e.g any techniques, programs or tutorials that maybe useful for me to look into.

Also I'm really wanting to go into 3D animation in the future so I've started out by using the free program Blender to try my hand at 3D animating programs. But I'm unfortunately finding it very difficult to use. So I'm wondering if any of you have experience in 3D animation or know of some good tutorials or other programs I could try out. Also if any of you could maybe recommend good university courses that teach animating, concept art or illustration since i'll be making my choices for going to uni in England soon.

Any advice you could give me at all would be highly appreciated~