This spring, students in Niagara College’s Acting for Film and Digital Media made their debut in Toronto at the second annual Graduate Showcase.
With Toronto being the epicenter of the film and media industry, the event puts the spotlight on second year students eager to showcase their projects and talents to an audience of industry guests, family, friends and alumni.
Program Coordinator Lori Ravensborg says the event is a chance to celebrate student achievements, showcase emerging actors at NC, and introduce them to alumni, industry connections, and the Toronto film industry (casting directors, agencies and producers) broadly.
“We aim for this yearly event to grow in scope and scale to promote and expand our place within the industry,” said Ravensborg. “We are very proud of this emerging group of talented, creative actors ready to hit the ground running.”
Nearly 100 people were in attendance at Cody Hall, including members of NC’s Program Advisory Committee, Fiona Allan, Vice-President, Academic, Leo Tiberi, Dean of Media, Trades and Technology, and Charles Kopun, Associate Dean of the School of Media Studies.
The event included congratulatory remarks and included a screening of student projects from the academic year.
The screening included clips from Acting student collaborations with Broadcasting, Radio, Television and Film
Production students, a stunt video, clips in studio from an Actor on Set course, and segments from their final capstone demo projects.
The final capstone demos are five to seven minutes and a chance for students, working in small teams, to take a project from script to screen: adapting a script, building a production plan, shooting on location, and editing a final cut.
“These projects are small scale where collaboration and planning are key,” said Ravensborg. “They involve a team of two actor-producers who partner with another team of two to three students to crew for each other. This year’s results were fantastic!”
As the actors near the end of their program, many have already had meetings with agents and are well on their way to a successful start to their careers.
