After the loss of its former home in the now defunct Lester B. Pearson Civic Centre some three months ago, the City of Elliot Lake has found a new home for the Digital Creator North Program a few blocks away at 24 Ontario in the Scotiabank Plaza.
Following the Feb. 21 roof collapse at the Civic Centre, many area groups and organizations were displaced, including the local version of Digital Creator North. The program operates weekdays, 4 to 8 p.m. although the City's Coordinator of Culture and Recreation, Kate Matuszewski, says the hours may be extended to later in the day, this summer.
At Elliot Lake's Digital Creator North's new digs, Coordinator Shane Milijevic told ElliotLakeToday the skills and talents young people develop through digital media are invaluable and essential in fields like video production, audio recording, graphic design and coding.
"Having these kinds of programs available for teenagers and youth will help them realize their potential," said Milijevic. "We have kids that are really excited about animation. That's one of the big things that they love to do. I already had a kid in here who said he would like to do some stop motion. And we also have a very talented young animator from Elliot Lake Secondary School that's coming here already."
Milijevic is a photographer, videographer and a cinematographer. He says those are the areas he intends to focus on and is mostly involved in work involving filmmaking and editing, along with different areas of lighting.
Tuesdays and Thursdays at the lab they will offer workshops solely focused on one particular area of digital media.
"But we're going to have every sort of program within digital media creation. Anything digitally creative that they can think of that they can do on a computer, or photography," he said.
Mayor Dan Marchisella was on hand to cut the red ribbon for the Friday afternoon re-opening of the lab space at 24 Ontario.
Digital Creator North is a place where young people have a space dedicated to hands-off self-directed learning that sparks their imagination. Teens and youth are able to find their own paths through the arts and be able to create from whatever inspires them. Digital Creator North has branches in Sault Ste. Marie, Elliot Lake, North Bay, Temiskaming Shores, Sioux Lookout and Timmins.