It's the Small Things, Charlie Brown.Wildrbrain/Courtesty of Wildbrain
Canada’s largest entertainment union has certified two prominent Vancouver studios in the last month, making gains within the underrepresented animation and visual effects industries.
On Oct. 31, WildBrain’s Vancouver office became the second Canadian animation studio to join the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE). Workers at visual effects studio DNEG were certified two weeks later, on Nov. 15. DNEG is the first VFX studio in Canada to unionize that contracts out their services to larger production companies.
Each studio employs approximately 500 now-unionized workers, according to IATSE.
“For us, it’s just about trying to build an industry that is fairer, that is less precarious and that really values the incredibly talented workers who make this stuff every day,” said Will Gladman, an international representative for IATSE.
IATSE represents more than 168,000 film and television workers in the U.S. and Canada.
While the union has represented animators in the U.S. since the 1950s, Canadian animators and most VFX workers in both countries have remained without representation in the densely unionized entertainment industry.
The recently resolved Hollywood writers’ and actors’ strikes brought pay cuts and layoffs to Canada’s VFX and animation industries, hardships that smoothed the path for the union drive, said Mr. Gladman.
“People looked to the U.S. as an example of people who had enough and used their voice and fought for something together,” Mr. Gladman said. “It was really inspiring for a lot of people.”
The union said both companies have been co-operative in the certification process.
“We look forward to working constructively with the union to negotiate a collective agreement over the coming months while maintaining our high standard of creative work,” Stephanie Betts, executive vice-president of content creation at WildBrain, said in a statement.
DNEG declined to comment on the unionization.
According to the Vancouver Economic Commission, the city hosts the world’s largest cluster of domestic and foreign-owned VFX and animation businesses, with over 150 studios that generate more than 8,000 jobs.
Katie Winchester, a former animator at WildBrain, said animation work in Vancouver had been drying up since well before the strikes as studios cut back programming.
“This last year has been a pretty bad one for anyone working in the animation industry in Canada,” Ms. Winchester said.
Even in the best of times, Ms. Winchester said Canadian animation workers deal with precarious contract-based work marred by a lack of consistent benefits and low wages.
“Especially for a lot of young, keen people who just want to work in animation, they are just so eager and they’ve got so much passion that they can be exploited really easily,” Ms. Winchester said.
Jeremy Salter, another international representative for IATSE involved in organizing DNEG, said similar issues plague the VFX industry.
In a 2022 survey by IATSE, 39 per cent of VFX workers at studios that contract out their services reported working unpaid overtime and only 25 per cent reported consistent health care benefits. Of the total respondents, 68 per cent said working in VFX was unsustainable.
In their first collective agreements with WildBrain and DNEG, IATSE hopes to address the issues raised by animation and VFX workers.
IATSE reports receiving signed union cards from hundreds of animation and VFX workers across Canada, especially in the other major industry hubs Montreal and Toronto, but only Vancouver studios have reached certification.
Mr. Salter attributes Vancouver’s success to the workers’ determination and B.C.’s single-step certification process, which automatically certifies a union when 55 per cent of eligible workers sign cards.
Barry Eidlin, associate professor of sociology at McGill University, said there’s a growing interest in union organizing that’s risen with the postpandemic cost of living crisis and increasing visibility of strikes.
“There’s a general sense that the union option is back on the table,” Prof. Eidlin said.
He added that labour disputes, especially in the entertainment industry, spike during periods of reinvention and technological change.
“The push for unionization is an effort by workers to intervene in that process of technological change,” Prof. Eidlin said.
Protection from AI outsourcing was a major factor in the Hollywood strikes that animation and VFX workers are also looking to address in their union contracts, according to IATSE.
Ms. Winchester agreed that AI “makes artists in our line of work pretty nervous because it’s a threat to our livelihood, potentially.”
IATSE has had similar success organizing animation and VFX workers in the U.S.
Eighteen Disney VFX workers joined the union in October and another 70 previously non-unionized Disney animation production workers joined in November. In September, 50 Marvel VFX workers also voted unanimously to join IATSE.
In 2021, animation workers at Titmouse Vancouver became the first animation studio in Canada to ratify a collective agreement with IATSE, securing wage increases, defined overtime procedures and increased sick and personal days.