I'm new when it comes to animation. I mainly do still images where mesh density is not a concern in the majority of time. However, I'm learning rigging and thinking to start a very short animation. I understand animation alone is an art itself, but I would like to understand more the process.

For what I understand you don't import or rigg a million poly mesh as this would make tweaking hard / impossible down the line, so keeping your mesh as optimized as possible is ideal.

But here's my noob questions:

1st Q. After tweaking the mesh, I came up with what is shown in the attached image.
Is this too heavy for an animation?

2nd Q. If the mesh is good for animation, do you apply a displacement map or a normal map for high details. Given the nature / effects of a displacement map, will it work for animation? Or should I apply only the normal map for the fine details?

Appreciated for your feedbacks. Animator noob here