Studios abound, as do mega-budgets. Stranger Things, 1917, Assassin’s Creed… you only have to name one flagship production of the last 10 years to find a Montreal touch in its credits. The metropolis has made digital art of all kinds, an expertise sought after by industry giants. And the investment has paid off: with nearly 500 companies generating an estimated $2.5 billion* in revenue every year, Montreal has become a manna of opportunity for those with a passion for digital. Spotlight on two shining industries.

Visual effects and animation

Innovation is at the heart of the city’s cinematic DNA. First with the screening of North America’s first film on St-Laurent Boulevard in 1896: the Lumière brothers’ blurred images of a train entering a station. 90 years later, it was the turn of visionary Daniel Langlois to create the revolutionary Softimage animation software (acquired by the…