I can't speak for the animation field, but on the games side, it's not that bad. Yes, some companies abuse their employees, and it's a shame the employees put up with it. I personally keep a backup plan at all times, and if conditions do get bad for no good reason, I'm gone. If you do look at the games side, make sure to straight up ask them what their "crunch times" are like and how often they happen. Try and talk to grunt level employees too, and feel out the morale. It's pretty easy to identify what the work conditions will be like before signing any paperwork. My previous employer, SOE, had a lot of people with families, from the management down to the grunts. That helped keep things reasonable most of the time, and the studio even did lots of events where families were welcome to attend. If a manager asked people to work late, they knew the impact it would have outside the studio as well.

As for getting started, the game industry is still a lot about who you know, and I assume the animation industry may be similar. It's a lot easier to get a foot in the door when you know someone already there. I worked on the sidelines for a while, doing small contract jobs here and there while keeping a steady paycheck at Compaq/HP. The SOE opportunity came up, and my resume was handed to their tech director by an employee who had worked there for a while. That helped to get the interview process started, and then a successful 3 year job. Once I was in, I made plenty of contacts, and as they moved to other companies, I was kept informed of other possibilities.

As for a resource on the gaming side, look to Polycount, hosted on the same server as this BBS.