The Algonquin College of Applied Arts and Technology
Graduate Certificate in Visual Development for Entertainment
Ottawa, Canada
Graduate Certificate
DURATION
1 year
LANGUAGES
English
PACE
Full time
APPLICATION DEADLINE
EARLIEST START DATE
Sep 2026
STUDY FORMAT
On-Campus
Key Summary
Stir emotion through art with a career in visual storytelling.
In this one-year Visual Development for Entertainment Ontario College Graduate Certificate, you refine your artistic skills for a specialized career in the entertainment industry. As a visual development or concept artist, you take creative ideas and generate visual designs for a wide range of media products. This includes but is not limited to, creating characters, prop designs, and environments that help tell the story of a film, show, or video game. Building on your existing artistic knowledge, skills, and experience, you integrate current and emerging technologies and tools to enhance 2D and 3D entertainment industry outcomes. You develop project management, teamwork, visual research, and rapid visualization skills to refine and move concepts through industry-specific pre-production pipelines.
You apply your knowledge of cinematography to treat your art like a movie set creating believable concepts to augment the viewer experience. You enhance your artistic skills to evoke emotion through visual storytelling.
Develop problem-solving skills through art and design. You build leadership skills to produce, guide, and manage studio-ready artwork for the film and entertainment industry. Working with industry experts through the conceptual process in a studio environment, you apply industry-standard technologies and techniques such as:
- Visual development
- Concept art
- Digital drawing, painting, and 3D modeling
- Texture work
- Matte painting
- Motion capture art
- Traditional and digital sculpting
- Mixed media
- Storyboarding
Throughout the program, you practice presenting, defending, validating, and adjusting your creative pitch to communicate solutions and sell your ideas. Each course contributes to the development of an industry portfolio that showcases your abilities to augment, refine, and deliver evidence-informed visual concepts and visual storytelling.
This program is well-suited for students who:
- Are open to exploring various styles, techniques, and technologies to enhance existing artistic skills and abilities
- Have a passion for creative idea generation
- Are able to work in fast-paced individual and team environments
- Are detail and process-oriented
- Value and respect the ideas, perspectives, and expertise of others
Level 01
- ART0031 Concept Design 1
- ART0032 3D Sculpting for Visual Development
- ART0033 3D Design Technology for Entertainment
- ART0034 Industry Studio 1
- ART0035 Visual Research and Communication
Level 02
- ART0041 Concept Design 2
- ART0042 Production and Asset Development
- ART0043 3D Design Technology
- ART0044 Presentation and Pitch Development
- ART0045 Industry Studio 2
- MGT0125 Entrepreneurship for Independent Artists
The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:
- Pitch and defend evidence-informed concepts and artistic solutions with a variety of stakeholders to meet project goals
- Produce conceptualized art in multiple formats using a pre-production pipeline process in a studio environment to meet stakeholder needs
- Leverage existing and emerging technologies to drive innovative processes and outcomes for the visual development and concept art pipeline
- Tailor and present a professional creative industries portfolio to meet the needs of a variety of entertainment sector requirements
- Research, create, and prototype physical and digital deliverables to refine concepts and support visual problem-solving
- Apply entrepreneurial, business, and project management skills to facilitate the completion of individual and team entertainment industry deliverables
- Contribute to and lead multidisciplinary projects while soliciting, providing, and incorporating ongoing feedback to promote respectful, inclusive, and collaborative creative development environments
- Develop strategies for professional development to maintain currency, adapt to new technologies, and continuously improve creative skill
- Identify and apply discipline-specific practices that contribute to the local and global community through social responsibility, economic commitment, and environmental stewardship
Graduates may find employment as a(n) Art Director, Senior/Lead Concept Artist, Visual Development Artist, Character Artist, Environment Artist, Level Artist, Prop Artist, 2D or 3D Artist, Texture Artist, VFX Artist, Storyboard Artist, Lead Artist, Production Designer, Matte Painter, Background Painter, Clean-up Artist, Character Modeller, Lead Modeller.
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