VFS Digital Design recently hosted numerous industry guests and program alumni for a fun night of presentations, where graduating students showcased their favourite design projects of the year.

With only three minutes of stage time, each student took the podium and gave a concise rundown of their work, which ranged from interactive design in the cross-departmental “Project Space Squid” initiative to a community-minded social networking system, a biology-inspired motion graphics short, a darkly funny website that offers customizable wallpapers about cat overpopulation, and much more.

After the presentations wrapped, students got a chance to mingle with the industry guests and explain their work in more detail — the part of the Digital Design Appetizers night previous grads have looked back upon as a pivotal moment in their young careers.

“Students that are coming out of [Digital Design] are showing great work… and we’re always looking for people on the cutting edge,” said Marty Yaskowich, Managing Director, Digital at Tribal DDB Canada. “Some of the design that we saw tonight was for the iPad and new and emerging technologies, and that’s always a skill set that we’re looking for as we have to deliver that to our client base as well.”

“I was really blown away this time around,” said James Filbry, Art Director and Partner at Spring Advertising. “Everything has gone up quite a level, as far as the students and the work that they produced… The presentations are just getting better and better all the time.”

A host of alumni now working in the industry also came out to see the work currently being produced in the Digital Design program. It gave them a chance to meet the presenting students and industry guests, while also reflecting on their own time spent at VFS.

“[The Digital Design program] was a great experience,” said grad Rodrigo Gomez-Tagle, who is currently the Technical Experience Director at Blast Radius. “It was an intense, intense, intense experience. It really prepares you with not only the technical skills to achieve whatever they put in front of you, but they give you the foundation and all the processes behind what you need to create.”

Congrats to the newest graduates of Digital Design! Great presentations all around!

Check out some photos from the evening below, or on our Flickr page.