Prominently located on the Rochester Institute of Technology campus, MAGIC Spell Studios is a 52,000 square-foot academic, entrepreneurial, and commercial initiative whose core principle is “We Learn by Making Things”. It’s part commercial film production and media development studio and part academic laboratory.
The RIT Center for Media, Arts, Games, Interaction & Creativity (MAGIC) is a university wide research center and production studio focused on exploring interactive digital media. The first studio of its kind in the Northeast, this multidisciplinary, large scale facility links RIT’s internationally ranked academic programs with high tech facilities needed to commercialize computer gaming, film and animation, and digital media projects.
The two-story building brings multiple academic disciplines under one roof and includes academic office space, computer game development labs, incubator space, animations classrooms, research computing facility, 180-seat movie theater with projection booth, 7,000 SF sound stage, tiered 40-seat audio-to-video mixing suite, server room, and two entrepreneurial open-office computer work environments to be fit-out as flexible technology office suites.
Just as digital technology has blurred the lines between creative industries, MAGIC Spell Studios provides a first-of-its-kind facility that reflects these converging industries by bringing together various schools and departments across the university−computer game design, film, animation, and digital media−under one roof. Emphasizing student entrepreneurship and commercialization, MAGIC uniquely co-locates select faculty and students in a collaborative, interdepartmental, startup environment that is playful, fun, and inspiring.
Photo credit: David Lamb Photography
2019
AGC Jeffrey J. Zogg Build New York Award
