Media Arts

Overview

The  Media Arts BMA program from University of the Fraser Valley Students gain professional communication, creative problem solving, and project management skills. Concentrations allow students to specialize based on their chosen career paths and creative passions.

Students must complete one of the following concentrations as part of their degree:

• Digital Entertainment Arts: Integrating traditional art and design fundamentals with digital media technologies, this concentration is designed for students interested in concept art, motion design, animation, visual effects, interactive media, and games.
• Digital Performance: Investigating the intersection of live performance and virtual embodied experience, students focus on digital scenography, acting for digital media industries, or creating for immersive experiences, interactive performances, and mixed reality. 
• Film: Applied instruction in all areas of film production combined with the study of film as a global media form. Students gain industry-standard technical, creative, and professional skills and will situate their creative practice historically and theoretically.
• Interactive Media: Students design and produce engaging interactive experiences utilizing various digital media platforms such as mobile applications, games, online experiences, and mixed reality.
• Interactive Media Leadership: Students focus on problem-solving, facilitation, and persuasive communication, as well as basic creative production processes, to develop the skills needed to manage creative teams, coordinate work flow, and oversee large projects in new media.

Students admitted to the degree should seek advice from the Academic Advisor for Fine Arts, Design, and Media. Students should select courses based on their planned concentration beginning in their first year, and must make a formal declaration of their concentration to the Academic Advisor after completing 15 credits of lower-level core requirements and prior to the completion of 60 credits towards the degree. Exceptions may be made in special circumstances by the Academic Advisor and/or the Director of the School of Creative Arts.

Additional Features:

• Students learn industry-standard software and skills.
• State-of-the-art facilities include Mac and PC computer labs, a motion capture studio, and VR equipment

Career opportunities:

According to Creative BC, British Columbia is home to one of the world’s largest and most advanced interactive and digital entertainment cluster. It is also becoming known in Canada as a hub for virtual reality content creation. In fact, the interactive and digital media sector is one of the fastest growing industries in B.C. at a rate of 11% per year. The industry features average salaries of $84K and $2.3 billion in sales.

The main challenge of the industry is to attract and retain skilled talent. As a result, many opportunities exists for young content creators and creative entrepreneurs, either working as freelancers, or for a company or clients.

Employment opportunities exist for programmers, UX, web, and graphic designers, illustrators, writers, multimedia and special effects artists, project and production managers, video producers, performers, marketers, and animation and video game designers.

Because a wide range of companies need the services of talented content providers, media arts grads can choose the type of company that has the most appeal, whether it is a start-up, an  agency, a non-profit, or a multinational.