DAVE School recently received formal recognition by The Rookies and was named a Rookies Certified School®. What does this award mean to be a Rookies Certified School? This invite-only accolade identifies the best creative media schools that provide the most up-to-date and relevant industry training and education. In order to receive an invitation to apply to become a Rookies Certified School, a school must have either been invited by an independent panel advisor or have performed well in the Rookie Awards.
Earning this recognition means that DAVE School was assessed and reviewed by an independent panel with an in-depth review process. During this process, the panel came to the conclusion that DAVE School is best suited to prepare artists for careers in industry positions.
In order to qualify as a Rookies Certified School, the following factors are taken into consideration:
• Graduate Acceptance Rates
• Software and Curriculum: Each student workstation at DAVE School is a top-of-the-line desktop equipped with Geforce RTX2060/2070/2080ti display cards, 32 GB ram, and Intel Xeon W-2123 3.6 GHz processors. Our facility also hosts its own render farm that has 12 dedicated nodes and 150 nodes total.
• Alumni Feedback & Success Stories
I landed my first job at Treyarch, a AAA studio most famously known for Call of Duty: Black Ops. It’s so surreal being surrounded by some of the industry’s best artists and I’m beyond honored to be a part of this team. I want to thank the DAVE School for providing me with valuable skills and knowledge about the gaming industry. The Game 501 class especially prepared me for game production and industry-standard techniques, which I’m extremely grateful for. I’m glad I had the opportunity to attend this school. Thank you!!
Making the decision to attend the DAVE School was one of the best ones I’ve ever made. They trained me for real-life in production which has been a huge reason why I have continued to thrive in VFX since graduating. The DAVE school has also afforded me endless opportunities including jobs and a pool of talent I can pull from to help me fill my teams as I have entered more management positions within the industry. The DAVE School and its employees have been amazing from the date I was accepted and every day since graduating. I feel very fortunate to be a part of such a strong group of alumni and community fostered by the DAVE school.
Making the decision to attend the DAVE School was one of the best ones I’ve ever made. They trained me for real-life production which has been a huge reason why I have continued to thrive in VFX since graduating. The DAVE school has also afforded me endless opportunities including jobs and a pool of talent I can pull from to help me fill my teams as I have entered more management positions within the industry. The DAVE School and its employees have been amazing from the date I was accepted and every day since graduating. I feel very fortunate to be a part of such a strong group of alumni and community fostered by the DAVE school.
• Studios that Hire Graduates: Blur Studio, CoSA VFX, Digital Domain, Disney Interactive, Double Negative, Dreamworks Animation, EA Games, Encore, Framestore, FuseFX, Hydraulx, Inhance Digital, Insomniac Games, Lockheed Martin, Lucasfilm Animation, Luma, Mass Virtual, Method Studios, MPC, Mr X Inc, Nickelodeon, Pixomondo, Reel FX Animation, Rhythm & Hues Studios, Scanline VFX, Sony Imageworks, Stargate Studios, Stereo D, The Asylum, The Mill, The Third Floor, Valve, Walt Disney Animation, Zoic Studios and many more hire DAVE School graduates.
• Facilities and Resources: The DAVE School is located on the backlot of Universal Studios Florida™. Our 18,000 square foot facility includes learning and interactive labs, a dedicated Virtual and Real-Time production stage, a Vicon motion capture system, 3D printing, and VR/AR labs. Students have access to our facilities 7 days a week.
• Staff Development & Training: Our faculty are on the cutting edge of new technologies and are constantly helping research, develop and teach the new technologies being used in industry today. While faculty all maintain annual professional development plans, The DAVE School’s faculty all come from the front lines of the industries we teach and are, therefore, also on the front lines of developing the skills and technologies we teach. Technologies seen as “new” and “cutting edge” (such as virtual production), were being pioneered and taught by our faculty & staff as long as 8-10 years ago.
Recent initiatives include:- Virtual production integration into a traditional VFX offline pipeline- Single-camera photogrammetry for the acquisition of 3D digital human doubles- Remote training, workshops, orientations & events via virtual realityIntegration of multi-platform virtual reality asset pipelinesMxR pipelines for live multi-camera event productions in real-time virtual reality environments- Utilizing new AI & ML technology integrations for motion capture, rotoscoping, color correction, photogrammetry, motion tracking, voice synthesis, digital matte painting, etc.
What are the Rookie Awards?
The 11th annual Rookie Awards help promote young creative excellence in visual effects, animation, games, virtual reality, motion graphics, and 3D visualization. With over 4,000 entries by 566 schools in 98 countries, it is a great honor to win a Rookie Award.
• Relationship with Industry
• Quality of Student Work (All Years)
You can view DAVE School’s Rookies Certified School profile here.
About The DAVE School
The DAVE School was founded on June 8, 2000, by two Industry executives looking to create #CareerReady artists with a practical animation school. Today, The DAVE School offers specialized training in Visual Effects and Game Production with extensive practice under industry-level supervision.
Located on the backlot of Universal Studios Florida®, The DAVE School has an 18,000 square foot facility that includes learning and interactive labs, a dedicated Virtual and Real-Time production stage, a Vicon motion capture system, 3D printing, and VR/AR labs and secure student access 7 days a week.
NUC University (NUC) is an accredited institution and a member of the Middle States Commission on Higher Education (MSCHE) www.msche.org. NUC’s NUC University – IBC Technical Division (NUC-IBC), NUC University – Florida Technical College (NUC-FTC), and The Digital Animation & Visual Effects School (The DAVE School) is included in this accreditation. NUC’s accreditation status is Accreditation Reaffirmed. The Commission’s most recent action on the institution’s accreditation status on 2019 was to reaffirm accreditation. MSCHE is an institutional accrediting agency recognized by the U.S. Secretary of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA)