Just as festival season slowly comes to an end, the Toronto Film School and the Film Production Diploma program embraces new beginnings. We welcome our new students joining us from all around the world. We welcome two new extraordinary instructors to our rosters of unbelievable industry talent. Most excitingly, we embark on a new course curriculum designed to keep the Toronto Film School current and competitive within the ever changing film landscape.

The new course curriculum was developed after months of extraneous research including interviews with industry leaders and our advisory board, advice from cutting edge production and post production companies and, of course, suggestions from our students. Some of the new courses include Advanced Directing Techniques, Storyboards and Visual Storytelling and Motion Graphics and VFX. Changes were also made to the existing courses to modernize them even further, and gear them towards new industry standards.

Speaking of results, the Toronto Film School Festival of Films took place on September 24. We were extremely pleased to see the amazing turn out for both screenings and the awards ceremony. Joining us this year were distinguished guest presenters representing the Directors Guild of Canada, Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television, City of Toronto Film Sector Development and ACTRA. The winner of Best Picture was “The Lazarus Files” produced by Rafaella Scully and directed by Kyle Reaume. This year we are commemorating the winners of Best Picture with an induction on our newly minted Best Picture plaque, which will hang at the Dundas Square Campus.

Thanks to all the presenters, nominees and submitters for participating in the festival and we hope to see you all again next year.

Another great event held recently, during the Toronto International Film Festival, was a Toronto Film School co-hosted Hospitality Suite at the Intercontinental Hotel. We were partnered with television personality Melissa Di Marco of “Out There” to put on a networking event open to industry persons and of course, members of the Toronto Film School. It was attended by many of our current students, graduates and faculty and a great time was had by all.

The 40th annual Toronto International Film Festival has also just concluded after 10 days of celebration of films from all over the world. During this time many of our students and graduates had the honor of volunteering and took in many screenings. Toronto Film School instructor Dusty Mancinelli was invited to participate in the TIFF Talent Lab, a comprehensive five-day artistic development programme led by esteemed governors who guided 20 emerging filmmakers in group discussions that focus on creativity, the artistic process and independent voices. Congratulations Dusty on such a prestigious honour.

Many months ago the City of Toronto approached us and asked if the Toronto Film School would like to participate in a contest honouring the 800^th anniversary of the Magna Carta. The screening for the top films took place on September 28 at the Bloor Hot Doc Theater and we were delighted that of the top 10 films selected Toronto Film School took six out of 10 including all 3 top positions. Read all the details here.

Welcome to two new members of our faculty Pino Halili and Matt Stasyna. Matt is a motion graphics artist and filmmaker who also teaches in the Graphic Design & Interactive Media Diploma program. His specialities include motion graphics, video editing and 3D modelling. Some of his past work includes projects for NBA.com, Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment and TSN.  See more on Matt here.

Pino Halili is the owner partner of Post City Sound here in Toronto and his past employers include SONY, CBC, and Deluxe Toronto. We are very lucky to have these two talented men join our faculty.

Let’s also congratulate Toronto Film School instructor Michael Paszt on a successful launch of this new film streaming website Raven Banner Releasing, as well as the successful acquisition of Cannes, Art Cinema Award winner “Embrace of the Serpent” for Raven Banner’s distribution arm Northern Banner. “Embrace the Serpent” is a foreign language film about colonialism in the Amazon and it is poised for Oscar contention.

Our students and graduates continue to impress landing all sorts of gigs and opportunities from art directing major ad campaigns like Wrigley’s Gum to working in distribution offices, production jobs on major film shoots and landing televisions pilots. We are very proud.

Coming up this fall is another amazing round of TIFF Higher Learning. You can read all the details here. On a further note TIFF Bell Lightbox has given us many wonderful Student Cinephiles’s Handbooks , which can offer you a Student Membership and 2-for-1 coupons to a regular screening at the TIFF Bell Lightbox.

We also intend on more exciting field trips like a recent trip to the Docville Movie Set in Newcastle, ON where 20 of our current students and alumni shoot freely around an authentic Western-themed town for the day.  Not only were our alumni happy and honoured to give back, but our current students got a first hand look in what may lay in store for them as stories and advice were freely traded. In this shoot we pushed boundaries and utilized the use of a 10 tonne equipment truck, extensive and complicated set-ups, generators, Aerial Drones, motion capture techniques and shot using various cameras including our main camera The 6K Red Epic Dragon. We also will continue to take field trips to locations like equipment rental houses, camera rental facilities and The Bell Lightbox. There are also many special guest lectures in the works and other surprise events. As always, keep your eyes peeled to the bulletin boards for updates.

Christopher Lane is an instructor of the Film Production Diploma Program at Toronto Film School. He is a writer, producer and director who has been working in the film industry for more than 20 years.