Supinfocom’s stellar student animation represents the flourishing digital talent in Valenciennes. Unless otherwise indicated, all images are courtesy of CCIV.

Every year it seems that Supinfocom’s stellar student animation is represented at SIGGRAPH’s Electronic Theater, and after visiting the school in Valenciennes this past December as part of a tour of DCC in northern France (which is both hospitable and cosmopolitan), it’s clear why: the students are getting an excellent grounding in storytelling as well as animation production before embarking on prosperous careers. The same can be said of the talented students matriculating from the sister Supinfogame program at the Valenciennes campus, as well as the nearby industrial design school, ISD, the data processing institute, IIE, and the audiovisual cluster from the University of Valenciennes known as DREAM.

Trouble is: it’s hard to keep the local talent in Valenciennes while trying to attract foreign investment in animation and visual effects. That’s where the Valenciennes Chamber of Commerce comes in. Thanks to its generous financial support and passionate commitment to DCC, Valenciennes is slowly maturing. Five years ago, the chamber was instrumental in the creation of the Digital Studios, which houses 21 firms and employs 130 digital professionals from the area. The chamber initially subsidizes the startups until they become self-sufficient. These include Xelios/E-Software, a leader in biometric systems; GB One, a computer graphics, E-business firm specializing in digital conversion and colorization of mangas; and IP4U, which is devoted to multi-media support for cell phone, PC, videogame, cartoons and TV spot content.

But the chamber isn’t stopping there. According to managing director Yves Louze, the chamber is embarking on an export project to Pune, India. Last year, it signed an agreement with a financial partner in Pune to set up a digital training campus involving instructors from Supinfocom, Supinfogame and ISD. They are in the process of finding recruits from these schools to send to Pune, with the ultimate goal of videogame development and the creation of franchises from Valenciennes.

In addition, Louze has an even more ambitious goal for Valenciennes: the creation of a new campus to serve as an animation and digital incubator, which would house Supinfocom, Supinfogame, ISD and IIE. The Technopol, as Louze refers to it, would be built in five phases. But this project would require 30 million Euros for the construction of the campus, and so far the chamber has only 10 million to invest. Louze plans to borrow 10 million and raise the additional 10 million from private financing.

Meanwhile, Supinfocom and Supinfogame continue to evolve in Valenciennes as intensive four-year programs under the enthusiastic leadership of Marie-Anne Fontenier, who also spearheads the local E-magiciens student festival (held Dec. 5-8 last year), organized by the chamber and the Industry of the Valenciennes region.

The Valenciennes Chamber of Commerce was instrumental in the creation of the Digital Studios, which houses 21 firms and employs 130 digital professionals. It subsidizes the startups until they become self-sufficient.

Supinfocom - Valenciennes initially includes two years of classic design and art instruction before preparing for 3D animation (a sister animation school is located to the south in Arles). There are around 50 students in the program and the production classes are equally divided between Max and Maya concentration (students randomly specialize in one or the other). Individual story ideas are pitched to a faculty committee and 16 projects are approved, with collaborative teams of two or three. According to Fontenier, 3D courses will soon be expanded to allow an extra year to flesh out story and animation.

Carlos Leon is one promising Supinfocom student. He’s from Columbia, where he previously served as an English translator in the army, and has already interned at Framestore CFC. With a week to go before his deadline, he’s feverishly finishing his 3D animatic along with his colleagues. His graduate project is called Al Dente (done in Maya) and it’s about an Italian girl that falls into an ogre’s kitchen. Children are secretly getting pulled into spaghetti while sleeping. There are dancing meatballs, a saturated, cartoony, Disney style and some Dali character inspiration. Interestingly, the project has evolved from a more philosophical approach because the metaphor of being pulled by strings has already been done to death at Supinfocom. Leon has one more year to go and we’ll certainly be on the lookout for Al Dente on the festival circuit.

At Supinfogame, meanwhile, a second-year videogame class is working on its prototype projects. Like the film projects, they are diverse in nature. They include Griffin Penguin, in which Griffin’s temperature rises and lowers to fight his enemies; The Core, a sci-fi RTS game; Capucine, a non-violent game about the adventures of a little girl, the last life force on earth; and Dirty Racer, a multiplayer racing game in which the drivers try to avoid getting too dirty.

In nearby Lille, which is in the midst of a festive Bombay tribute, there are digital startups too. Ankama Studio, for instance, has already made a name for itself with the popular multiplayer online role playing game Dofus, which continues to expand beyond its 125,000 subscriber base. In fact, according to founder/director Emmanuel Darras, Ankama will soon be relocating to a larger facility and recruiting more staff to support the launch of additional Flash-based games.