Well, it’s that time – the VFS Blog team is going on holiday like everybody else. But in case you’re looking for something to read (or you’re new to our blog), here’s a roundup of twelve of our favourite VFS grad stories of the year. Choosing was no easy task!

We hope you’ve enjoyed our blog over the past year as much as we’ve enjoyed writing it.

See you in 2008!

January. Seas of Europa – Alive & Swimming. A post-mortem on one of Game Design‘s most beautiful student projects.

February. Makeup Students Giving Back. Grads of the Makeup program volunteer for Variety Telethon.

March. 10 Things I Learned at Praxis. A Writing grad walks us through her experience as a Praxis Screenplay Fellow.

April. There Is No “Try”. A video interview with one of two Sound Design grads hired at Skywalker Sound.

May. A Pirate’s Life for Grad. A video of 3D grad Ben Sanders, who worked as an animator on Pirates of the Caribbean 3, Happy Feet, and The Golden Compass.

June. Feeling the Leo Love. Grads of Film Production, Makeup, Sound Design, and Classical Animation make noise at the 2007 Leo Awards.

July. The Design of Happiness. Mark Miller, a Digital Design grad, on life after school.

August. Down & Dirty With Skate. Game Design grad Chris Klein talks about his role on the well-reviewed new game Skate.

September. Film Grad Knows Promotion. Paul St. Amand, a graduate of the Film program, on getting his documentary Parallels seen by the world.

October. When Contacts Pay Off. Entertainment Business Management grad Nick Soukthavone takes another step toward the career of his dreams.

November. Grads Win Stop Motion Prize. Several Classical Animation grads and one instructor win a Stop Motion Animation contest.

December. Wisdom from Whistler. Acting for Film & TV graduate Holly Dignard (Whistler) on life as a working actor.

VFS Managing Director Marty Hasselbach and Co-Founder Richard Appleby accepting a certificate at the 2007 B.C. Export Award

Not long ago, VFS was named a Top 25 Exporter as part of the 2007 B.C. Export Awards, which are administered by Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters (CME) and the B.C. Ministry of Economic Development. VFS was also one of three finalists for the Professional & Services Award.

We pride ourselves on our international reach and reputation. We’ve made our students’ work freely available online to a global audience on YouTube, Joost, and beyond, we’ve partnered with companies like Adobe and EA, and our website is available in 14 languages.

It all shows in our student body – fully 50% of which is made up of international students. For example, students in a graduating Classical Animation class this year hailed from as far afield as China, India, Korea, Australia, Bulgaria, and Egypt. That says it all.

To accommodate and foster this global student culture, we’ve responded with international foreign language orientation and an ESL education partnership with the Vancouver English Centre. We’re also developing a task force to work with Immigration Canada to help companies more quickly and efficiently hire foreign graduates.

In short, we export the VFS experience by importing talent from all over the world. And for that, it’s a great honour to be recognized.

Take a look at this video profile of VFS produced for the awards:

We know it’s a crazy time of year, but we want to remind all the VFS students and grads out there about our Artwork Competition. Check the link for the lowdown, but the short version is – we’re looking for high-res stills of student work made at VFS. Send in your work, and you’ll be entered in a drawing to win a complete set of Total Textures CDs, valued at $1000.

Thanks to those who have entered so far. And to those who haven’t, the deadline is Friday, December 21st!