BA (Hons) Creative Media

The key to our course design is understanding what the creative industries value, what’s attractive to employers and the diverse opportunities of creative media. Being a flexible media maker in a continually-evolving media landscape futureproofs your qualification.

Our graduates are multi-skilled, flexible practitioners fulfilling diverse roles in the global media ecosystem. We are proud of how we equip our students for an everchanging media landscape. You will graduate with:

• confidence in the value of your creative voice 
• a fully developed professional profile and portfolio
• industry contacts
• experience working on collaborations beyond the University
• experience pitching ideas, negotiating with clients, branding, marketing and promoting
• experience designing and making for various contexts, from social media campaigns to live events
• knowledge of the social and ethical impact of professional media 
• the ability to research and articulate ideas effectively.

Our graduates work as directors, producers, camera crew, editors and sound designers. They set up successful businesses. They become fashion and travel photographers, animators, book illustrators, web designers and curators. They are independent artists, marketing and advertising executives, media strategists, game makers and educators. Others continue into postgraduate study and become academics. 

They can be found at the BBC, Disney and Radio One. Their work is found at the BAFTAs, in the National Portrait Gallery, on the cover of Vogue magazine and in the creative offices of Google and Facebook.

What can you do with a media degree?

• Study a range of media practices, including video, photography, sound, animation and digital media.
  
  
• Enjoy the freedom to experiment: choose to focus on one medium, develop several or integrate across the range to find your creative voice.
  
  
• Develop projects to suit your creative and career ambitions. Open doors to your future career by showcasing your work to the public and developing a portfolio of work. Enhance your professional profile further by engaging with our live briefs.
  
  
• Advance your technical skills using our outstanding equipment and facilities, including a fully equipped cinema, moving image studio with green screen, photographic and sound studios, computer labs, animation rostrums and much more.
  
  
• Learn from award-winning tutors from industry, arts practice and academic research. Benefit from strong links with the industry such as the BBC, ITV and Royal Television Society along with regional arts and community groups, giving you the opportunity to develop and realise creative collaborations beyond the University.
  

• Year 1

• You will explore what creative media means to you by making a series of short, critically framed, practical projects. You will investigate narrative expression and cultural context in disciplines including still and moving image, sound, interaction and animation. You will also work beyond the University on a live industry brief and public exhibition or screening that will introduce professional working methods and audience reception.
  

  Core modules

  • Creative Media Practice (MEDI411)

    This module will provide students with a set of challenges to promote understanding of contemporary Media Arts practices and the context in which these practices sit. It will explore how theory and practice interlink as well as giving the students a grounding in relevant methodology.

  • Narratives (MEDI412)

    This module will introduce to students the creative possibilities of working with ideas of narrative and meaning construction in creative media. This is a practice-led module which integrates and examines various theories of and approaches to narrative, storytelling and meaning construction.

  • Transmedia Branding (MEDI413)

    This module challenges students to produce a transmedia branding campaign in response to a live brief. Students will explore the techniques of this field and critical responses to the ‘culture industry’; underpin practical skills with creative and theoretical approaches; and be introduced to the roles and responsibilities associated with group working.

  • Situating Practice (MEDI414)

    In this module students will be required to critically evaluate the skills and experience gained in previous modules and develop strategies for the future. They will be introduced to key critical approaches to presenting work to the public and engage in practice which explores the dialogue between their work and wider contexts. This module includes group working.

• Year 2

• You will study advanced media practice and explore critical frameworks for your work. Experimentation and developing your creative voice are at the heart of this part of the course. You will collaborate with industry partners on a socially-engaged media project and gain professional confidence. Study of media theory will enhance your academic skills and media creation process. There is also opportunity to study abroad in stage 2.
  

  Core modules

  • Critical Dialogues (MEDI513)

    Critical Dialogues mixes contemporary debates and media histories in a lively lecture/seminar programme. The module provides exposure to seminal media arts theory / practice and facilitates students to engage critically with their own work, situated in the context of established practitioners.

  • Experiment (MEDI514)

    The module provides the framework for a student lo take creative risks, broaden their practical skills, enhance their confidence and to develop their own creative voice. It provides a framework in which to research and develop one or more large-scale projects built on a sense of personal practice by means of practical experiments, underpinned by workshops, contextual research and ongoing reflection.

  • Common Challenge: Social Context (MEDI516)

    This module offers an opportunity for students to work collaboratively on projects that will develop and enhance their professional and creative skills in working towards a collective outcome. It places creativity at the core of collaboration alongside the facilitation of new ideas and practices.

  • Interactive and Immersive Media (MEDI515)

    Students will experiment with interactive and Immersive media through a range of approaches and software. Iterative project development will be a means to explore theoretical approaches, concepts and practices central to interactive and immersive media. Including: environmental storytelling, non-linear structures, user experiences, mechanics, multimodality, prototyping and playtesting.

• Final year

• The final year is about your passions, interests and ambitions. You complete two major self-directed projects in independent practice and collaborative practice. Hone your research skills in a dissertation and prepare for your future career in our professional module. You have the opportunity to showcase your achievements in a substantial public exhibition. We also provide one-to-one mentoring by industry professionals and the opportunity to meet and network with potential employers.
  

  Core modules

  • Collaborative and Contextual Practice (MEDI609)

    In this module you will undertake a collaborative project, emphasis will be placed on working processes and methodologies, group interaction, the planning and completion of the project within a defined context. This module provides an important critical context arising from issues relating to collaborative practice, working from a research and development stage through to realisation in order to contribute new objects or forms of cultural production.

  • Independent Practice (MEDI611)

    Drawing on a growing sense of practice, underpinned by tutorial support, students will develop a large scale project through an application of practical and critical skills.

  • Common Dissertation: Critical Practices (ADA600)

    The module engages students in situating practice through research, contextualisation and critical reflection, in relation to their final stage study and post University aspirations. Programmes can offer: a traditional dissertation; preparation for an extended dissertation; situating existing practice; or the construction of a new body of work as practice-based research.

  • Media Futures (MEDI612)

    This module will support students in their aspirations beyond graduation. Students will identify career/ postgraduate aims and further develop their portfolios and professional profiles to effectively promote themselves and their practice in appropriate contexts.

Every undergraduate taught course has a detailed programme specification document describing the course aims, the course structure, the teaching and learning methods, the learning outcomes and the rules of assessment.

The following programme specification represents the latest course structure and may be subject to change:

BA Hons Creative Media Programme Specification 6796

UCAS tariff

96 - 112