Immigrating to Canada for VFX artists

Hey guys,

I have moved from Israel to Canada almost 2 years ago to pursuit a career in the VFX film industry and I with you some of my story and stuff I now know.
This post will be more informational than my Journey.

Before we talk about school, residence, visa and all that, it’s important that you know a few things.
The entire process of Canada takes several months from the moment you decide, mostly because the college courses have closed and you can only register for courses that open in six months or later, so even if you are not sure you can still start and stop the registration process.

Another thing, this whole document is written from my experience and what I’m going through, when you decided to go, the information here may be inaccurate, including prices / visas and everything recorded here, so take it with a grain of salt.

As for my experience, I chose to study in Think Tank, Mentorship and Pre Mentorship program, so the information refers mainly to the Vancouver area.
The prices in the other areas are very different, as are the weather conditions, the housing market situation and everything listed here.
And every time I wrote down a dollar, I meant the Canadian dollar which is a bit cheaper than the US Dollar.

Where to learn?
If you come to learn the first thing you have to decide is at which college and where to go.
Since there are so many colleges and tracks, I will not start to detail each and you need to check and decide.
A quick Google search will give you all the colleges in Canada.
We will talk later about visas but some collages are eligible for post graduate work permit and some not.
When you are looking for a place to study it is worthwhile to take into account, student jobs, who teachers, location and work visa.
It is important to know that the gaming industry is not in a hurry to issue visas to employees and only the film industry is still issuing, in very unusual cases, but there is more chance of getting a visa through them.

Visa application process
The Canadian institution from which you ask a student visa is CIC, which is Canada Immigration and Citizenship.
All applications and reports can be made on the website.
The process itself is quite simple but it takes time, so it’s best to start once you receive a college certificate from the school you registered, the certificate depends, of course, on the advance you need to pay.
There are two options to connect to their system, I made a GCKey.
There are a number of documents that need to be sent for approval,
Fill in the form they are requesting.
- A recent account status from the bank, from my experience in shekels and Hebrew is fine.
- Passport, make sure it is valid until after graduation.
- Letter of acceptance from your school.
- And of course there is also an initial payment to send the documents.

Tip: There is a request for an electronic signature, once you submit all the documents and fill out the forms on the next page you will need to register your name that it will be the electronic signature.

Student visa
A student visa allows you to stay in Canada. If you want to work while studying, you can apply for a work permit for 20 work hours a week. You do not have the possibility to start a regular job in the studio, for that you need a work visa or do a PR talk about it later on.
In order to work you will need SIN number which is simple to get once you are in Canada.

When to book a flight ticket?
It is best to book an airline ticket after you have received the visa, and remember that after you have the card, you also need to arrange the initial residence with the landing.

Initial arrival
It is recommended to arrive a few weeks before the start of studies, once you arrive there are some matters that are important to close fast,
- Opening a Canadian bank account includes a credit card
- Compass Card for bus and trains
- Local phone number (optional but not recommended)
- Apartment
- If the apartment is not furnished then furniture.
- General equipment (clothes for winter and so on)

Canadian bank account
One of the first things to worry about is to open a Canadian bank account and transfer money on it. There are several central banks here — BMO, TD, CIBC and HSBD — it does not matter which one you chose in the begining.
I opened a BMO near the Think Tank and showed them the student visa, and I received an account without fees.
Apparently in others it is like that but I was told that in general I do not pay commissions in Canada and the US …
Most people here work with the Debit card, which makes life a lot easier. Ordinary credit can be problematic because we do not have a credit history.

Compass Card
It is a travel ticket in Vancouver, it will serve you on the bus, train and seabus.
Once you go to a train or to a central bus stop there are machines that take out the card.
You can load it on the same machines or on the Internet if you registered it, you can not load it when you get on the bus.
Trip is valid for an hour and a half, and you can pass between buses, Skyline and Seabus.
According to what I was told this card is for British Colombia specifically.

Local phone number
Making a local number is very easy, apps like WhatsApp are less common.
A local number helps mostly when looking for an apartment, a job, ordering things, including things from the bank like credit, checks, etc.

Finding a place to live
There are a number of sites through which you can find a place to live. Keep in mind that during the studies you will most likely be in college, and the house will be used mainly for sleeping, Sundays when the colleges are closed and holidays when there is no school.

Apartment — rising in the area $ 1000- $ 2000, a reasonable house will cost in the area $ 1400.
Roommates — depending on the number of roommates, can be found in the area $ 700.
And homestay — which is a room in the home of a family, most often also in the area $ 700
In recent times there has been more immigration to Canada and this has caused a significant price increase in Vancouver.

For example, I saw an apartment for $ 1390, and the landlord said that this time more than 30 people came to see, a situation he had never had and he was thinking of going up Price … I never heard from him again.
The cheap apartments come with a lot of people, some with organized work or support, so they have priority, and in the expensive apartments there are also couples who are usually more organized than students.

They’ll also ask you to see how much money you have in your bank account to make sure you can make payments, which is one of the reasons
That it is important to open a bank account and transfer the money. It is recommended that a bank account be over $ 10,000.

Another thing is the checks. Ordering checks costs money, but the owner may demand them. The problem is that it takes time for checks to arrive, so if you do not order, you may lose an apartment that wants checks, and if so, maybe You’ll find an apartment that you do not need and you just spent money on it.

The price can also include bills and the Internet or ask you to add a little more for the accounts, another option is Homestays, which means that you rent a room in a family’s apartment, you are big time living at home,

Another thing to know is that some apartments will have a move in-out fee, which is a one-time fee when you enter a new apartment. Not all apartments have it but in my case it cost $ 200, it’s mostly for cleaning.
There are apartments here that insurance apartment is mandatory, not only at the level of the contract, but the receipt of the key depends on proof that you have done insurance apartment, it is another payment once a year and very dependent on the situation of the apartment and building. Can reach $ 250 to $ 400.

Search apartment can take time, especially since most apartments here are from craiglists and apartment owners do not always bother to answer.
Tip: If your first apartment is AirBNB, then ask the landlord to be your reference.

Prices
In Canada and the US Prices are before taxes, which means that if you write on something that costs $ 10 this is not the amount you will pay, at the register they will add taxes on it and it will be about $ 11.
Taxes varies between products, for example, Alcohol has more taxes than food.
It is relatively low but has a higher impact in large amounts, for example I bought a laptop that costs $ 1600 and the actual price was $ 1900 after taxes.

From what I experience, taxes do not apply to rent.

Home Products
If you go into a new house then there are the first purchases of a bed, chairs, kitchen utensils and so on.
In my case it was about ​​$2,000 for apartment furniture (things from IKEA and Dollar Store of course).

Shopping
I saved $ 500 a month for shopping and that was more than enough.

Bills
Electricity bill goes from $ 20 — $ 100 per month, depending on how much you use, in winter for example there is a lot more usage of heating.
Internet costs $ 35- $100 per month, just make sure your price won’t change after a few month.

Mobile phones
There are several companies that can be done, from my Freedom test offer the cheapest price.
But they do not work in all of Canada, but only in several major cities, in other places the cell phone will be routed to another network and pay more.
Costs in the region are $ 40- $ 50 per month.
The cell phone in Israel will probably work but it’s not sure that in all the companies, it’s important to check it out before you connect.
You can check the frequencies of devices by country in the Frequency Check.

health insurance
It is important to do health insurance in your country before flying for at least 3 months since it take 3 month to get the Canadian health insurance, and it costs $ 37.5 a month.
You are required by law to have Canadian health insurance.

Work visa / PR — Permanent Resident
In order to work in one of the studios you need to obtain a work permit or do PR (Permanent Resident). Which is currently my biggest problem.
The studios can get you a work permit on their own, but in order for the workplaces to prefer Canadian people, the Canadian government issued a law that requires foreign workers to receive a salary of $ 80,000 a year.
That’s an amount the studios will not spend on Junior’s roles. And most people who come to Canada are without experience in AAA games or in the VFX industry are considered juniors.
I realized that studios have more options to issue a work permit, but that requires them to wait for a couple of months, and most of the workplaces will look for people who can start soon.
There are lots of other ways to get a work permit or PR but the rules change every few months so it’s better to check with an immigration company or an immigration attorney.
Europeans has something called Working holiday which gives them a work permit but it depend on the country and age. Check it out before relying on it.
Currently, most non-Canadian and not european srudents can not get a job here and are looking for Europe.

Weather
When I landed in September it was raining but it is much less terrible than people think, the rain here is relatively calm and does not prevent you from doing anything, back home is Israel the rain was more aggressive and within a few minutes you can be soaked . Here you can walk in the rain and everything is okay.
Now November and I’m still going with a short shirt and over a leather jacket and it’s all good.
As far as snow, there is some of course but again it’s not that bad, it’s snowing several times in the winter and that’s it.

Moving to Canada with a Pet
There are a lot of articles on the Internet that talk about flying on pets, with a lot of things to check, some of them are
- It is important to buy the cage before the flight make them get used to it.
- When booking a flight ticket make sure you can fly an animal on the flight you ordered.
- Make sure the pilots are on board when they know that there is an animal, and also harass the flight attendants during flight (once / twice do not get carried away).
- Animals under a certain weight can be with you in the seat.
- When you arrive in Canada and receive a local number, then make a new tag
with the number.
- And there are a few other things, look for more information on Google!
- Even a flight to Canada is a long flight so it is better to take a cage one size
larger than necessary, although after that you should also take him with you to the apartment and it is really uncomfortable.

I think it’s better to fly straight to Toronto, although the flight is longer but you do not have to deal with the approvals of a number of countries. And the second flight is internal in Canada so departure from the field is very quick.
There are a number of companies that help the whole process, they will explain what is needed, will do the documents, and will accompany you. It costs about $200 from what I realized it can save a headache but I did not use them and the pet’s move to Canada is relatively simple.

Things to know, but not really mandatory :)
Gym
the prices here are very cheap between $ 10 — $ 20 a month, and there is an initial payment around $ 40 when registering.

Cinema
Tuesdays is cheap days, going out $ 7.2 instead of $ 13.5 on normal days

In conclusion
It’s a long process that takes a lot of time and money, and you have to get into it after you’ve checked everything.
As I wrote above, the situation at the moment in terms of visas are not ideal and there is always the risk that after you have invested time and money you will have to return back, but if this is something you really want, I think it is worth pursuing.

Good luck everyone!