VFS Digital Design

Digital Design at Vancouver Film School. Maybe not the first thing you think of when you hear "design school". Hey, that's okay, because there are advantages to being small. It's what makes us different. It's what lets us offer a one-year education that's about pushing design forward instead of just pushing buttons. Combining process and results in a package that spans graphic design, interactive design, motion design, and video production, no other school wastes so little of your time and demands so much.

The results speak for themselves. Students create award-winning portfolios (recently seen everywhere from design blogs to Al Jazeera) and our graduates work for the best agencies, collaborate with the biggest clients, and make the coolest things. Here are just three recent examples of what our alumni are up to.

When Google calls, you listen. Just ask recent VFS grads, Kasey Lum and Jorge R. Canedo Estrada, who were tapped by Google shortly after graduation to create a high-profile animated introduction to Google Voice. Someone at the search giant had seen and liked a short video they'd created with two other students halfway through their year at VFS. The Google collaboration "took about a month," Jorge explains. "They sent us the first script and we conceptualized the whole thing." (See the result at youtube.com/GoogleVoice.)

Leah Bancroft is helping keep other people's brains sharp. And her job at Vancouver-based brain-training game company Fit Brains is keeping her design skills sharp, too. "Being able to jump from 25 different games, I’ve been extremely lucky to help develop logos, styles, and overall themes for every project," she says. "I've learned a lot about work flow, time management, and teamwork, all of which I had a taste of in Digital Design." And the results of her interactive design work are especially rewarding. "I know that the greater purpose is designing to help people maintain one of the most important parts of the human body – the brain."

The Vancouver 2010 Olympics were a triumph of branding. An entire metro area was transformed by a small design team that included VFS Digital Design grad Shawn Parkinson. "Many say that an Olympic Games is the biggest branding exercise a city, province, nation can go through," says Shawn, who had a hand in designing the graphic identity, the medals, the torches, and much more. To Shawn, the result was unforgettable. "It's not often that one's work culminates in a huge nation-changing event that everyone is watching like that."

Experience VFS Digital Design For Yourself This Summer. Don’t take our word for it – this summer, you can try VFS Digital Design for yourself in our 5-day Digital Design Summer Intensive (July 12-16). A diverse group of design pros will guide you as you experience motion graphics, branding, video production, and interactive design. Find out more at vfs.com/summer2010. Special Offer: 10% discount off the Digital Design Summer Intensive course fee for Opus newsletter readers! Contact Shira at shira@vfs.com or 604.631.3562 to qualify and register.