The South West College (SWC) Enniskillen Campus recently hosted the fourth annual Northern Ireland Creative Hi-tech Expo (NICHE 4), which brought together 3D artists, illustrators and photographers for a celebration of digital creativity and innovation.
This year’s line-up included digital creative representatives from some of the most established studios in Europe including Ubisoft, Sumo Digital and DICE for a full day of workshops, keynotes and networking.
Paul McGovern, Lecturer in Creative Media, SWC said:
"Our creative industries are vitally important to the wider economy. Thanks to local success stories ‘Game of Thrones’ and ‘The Fall’, we are experiencing a huge surge of interest from creative talent from around the world.
“The expo’s workshops, panel discussions and keynote addresses highlighted opportunities within the design and development of creative solutions to modern business practices. Local creatives in education and industry were also encouraged to work together in order to harness the power of creativity.”
Guest speakers included: Rhianne Murphy (Sumo Digital); Shannon McManus (past student SWC); Linda Fahrlin (Atlantic Art Studios); Leonardo Lezzi (Ubisoft Reflections); Kim Aava (EA DICE); John Griffiths (Lead Environment Artist); Karen Stanley (Ubisoft Massive); Hannah Watts (Coatsink); Donal Philips (NI Screen) and Darragh Gorman (Light House Industries).
The expo is founded in digital creativity but seeks to not only appeal to those actively working or students aspiring to work in that sector but to raise awareness of opportunities for traditional sectors of the economy to diversify their business functions and embrace digital creativity as a way of working.
NICHE 4 was organised by the Department of Technology at South West College, in conjunction with the Connected programme. For further information on creative media/digital technologies courses or business support available at SWC please contact Paul.McGovern@swc.ac.uk or call 028 8225 0109