News
Film and Animation MFA

The extensive renovation of RIT’s College of Art and Design—with keen focuses on key areas within the internationally recognized School of Photographic Arts and Sciences (SPAS) and School of Film and Animation—made significant strides in 2021.

Assistant professor Amy Adrion—whose work has screened at South by Southwest, Sundance, and Tribeca film festival—recently directed and produced videos for an online streaming series featuring actors reading children’s books brought to life through animation.

Angélica Agélviz, Shana Dixon and Chloe Hayes — all 2019 School of Film and Animation graduates — worked on Nuevo Rico, an award-winning film seen as a potential Academy Award winner.

NASA’s Artemis program plans to return humans to the moon by 2025. However, in a new game developed by RIT faculty and students, people can use virtual reality to return even sooner.

The sixth annual event featured presentations on the latest virtual, augmented and mixed reality technologies that are driving various fields, from health care to theater to education. 

Nick Nicely '12 (3D Digital Design), founder of Video Plates and Backings, is providing all RIT students access to his library of more than 5,000 driving plates and moving set backdrops for use in films and media projects.

RIT's Schools of Art, American Crafts, Film and Animation, and Photographic Arts and Sciences are all under new leadership.

Shanti Thakur—who began her new role as director of RIT’s School of Film and Animation in the College of Art and Design earlier this month—is an award-winning fiction and documentary filmmaker who has taught for nearly two decades.

Selma Peña '22 MFA (Film and Animation), a screenwriter with an undergraduate psychology degree, is using her varied background to create compelling stories that are both meaningful and beautiful.

In the mid-1980s, Frank Deese of the School of Film and Animation interviewed Philip Agee to inform his screenplay on young CIA recruits. The conversation is detailed in A Drop of Treason.

For RIT student filmmakers who are storytelling in the midst of a pandemic, grey has become the new black. While it’s impossible for any production to eliminate all risk in front of and behind the camera, they’ve had to constantly consider the additional time and safety procedures necessary to achieve the perfect shot.

WXXI’s “Connections” program features Ambarien Alqadar, assistant professor in the School of Film and Animation.