British Columbia is celebrated its screen-based industries Wednesday and officially proclaimed Sept. 21 as "Screen in B.C. Day"
Representatives from the provincial government, Creative BC, the Motion Picture Production Industry Association of British Columbia, the Canadian Media Producers Association, as well as industry stakeholders, met Wednesday to make the provincial proclamation and offered up some words of encouragement to industry leaders in a few cities around the province.
"It is my pleasure to be here in Kelowna today celebrating Screen in B.C. Day. We know the digital media industry has seen strong growth in B.C., and is currently comprised of over 1,100 companies employing over 16,000 people," said Norm Letnick, MLA for Kelowna Lake Country, during the Kelowna event.
"Companies like Hyper Hippo and Yeti Farm Creative are the heart and soul of Kelowna's creative sector, and I wish them continued success as they grow and expand, yielding more job opportunities for the local community."
Steve Thomson, MLA for Kelowna- Mission, and Norm Letnick, MLA for Kelowna-Lake Country, were joined by representatives from Creative BC and the Okanagan Film Commission, where they toured Hyper Hippo Productions, an organization that specializes in the creative development, pre-production, animation, compositing and rendering for video games.
Since 2014, Hyper Hippo has released over 50 games to web, mobile, Steam and PlayStation platforms, including the award-winning and record-breaking title, AdVenture Capitalist.
"Specialized training and bold attitude are really important traits to have for our employees. When you're making games as fast as we are, you have to wear a bunch of different hats, Sam Fisher, Hyper Hippo.
"One day you can be doing player support for one game, the next you can be doing the musical score for another. We expect to double our workers in less than a year. The jobs we're creating are great jobs, and people love coming to work because these are their dream jobs. This is an important part of B.C.'s future economy, and British Columbia is the best place to start up."
The tour continued at Yeti Farm Creative, a Kelowna based studio specializing in animation design, storyboards, and writing. Yeti Farm Creative has created notable children's shows including Rocket Monkeys (Seasons 2 and 3) (Teletoon/CN), Pirate Express (Teletoon), and Babar (Nelvana).
Over the last five years, British Columbia has grown to become one of the world's largest clusters for visual effects and digital animation companies, confirming the province's reputation as a global full-service production centre, capable of performing the complete spectrum of services required for major productions.
British Columbia's motion-picture industry supports approximately 25,000 direct and indirect jobs.