Film Production (with Foundation Year)

This module aims to build student self-awareness and confidence in their academic ability. By exploring their personal learning identity and skills set, and the meaning of educational success, students will develop their academic knowledge, skills and understanding to support their future studies. In this module, students will have the opportunity to develop their skills in searching for, identifying, reading and understanding  cademic texts. They will practice essay writing and examination techniques, and develop their presentation skills. Students will have opportunities for engaging in discussion and debates, and in the giving and receiving of constructive feedback.

This module is designed to enable students to develop the key critical thinking skills necessary for university study and beyond. Through a combination of lectures and small group seminars the class will discuss many of the key issues that underpin discussion of all academic disciplines. The lectures will introduce key themes and issues that enable students to make sense of the world in a critical fashion while the seminars will allow students to discuss these issues and engage with key readings each week. Students are encouraged to apply these abstract concepts to their specific degree path.

This module explores key developments and themes in the history of modern literature and film. It will in particular explore the impacts of contemporary social and historical conditions upon these art forms, and the impacts of these art forms upon those conditions. The module will include formal lectures on each week’s topic, followed by more interactive seminar sessions. In addition to classroom discussions, seminars will include students' formative presentations of their work in progress and workshopping opportunities for the development of students' essays through tutor and peer feedback and advice.

This module engages students with the core skills in writing professionally, creatively, commercially and journalistically, from research and ideas generation to structure, style and presentation. The module will be delivered through a series of workshops which will include presentations of their work in progress and workshopping opportunities for the development of students' individual writing practice and draft assessment work through tutor and peer feedback and advice.

This is a practical module in which students will be supported and guided to work in terms to develop skills to plan, perform, present and produce a film production project in drama or documentary. The module will be delivered through a series of workshops which will include students' presentations of their work in progress and workshopping opportunities for the development of students' performances and productions through tutor and peer feedback and advice.

This module introduces and interrogates key principles of visual and verbal communication and thus enhances media and digital literacy. In doing so, it explores ways in which we might enhance our status as critical citizens of modern democracies. The module will include formal lectures on each week’s topic, followed by interactive seminar sessions. In addition to classroom discussions, seminars will include workshopping opportunities for the development of students' essays through tutor and peer feedback and advice.

What is the meaning of life? It is a question often either overlooked within academic discussion, or else deemed as having no relevance. For some, however, the absence of this disappearance from academia is unfortunate, even regrettable. In this module, we will consider this question directly, as well as via a critical engagement with a range of appropriate films. Each week a different aspect of this wider debate will be considered, with a specific feature film or documentary used as the catalyst for these debates.

This module offers students the opportunity to gain core competencies in professional camera and lighting equipment operation for both drama and documentary production work. Undertaking intensive hands-on workshops, students’ skills and creativity are honed and tested thorough weekly formative exercises designed to foster knowledge and practical application across both drama and documentary disciplines. Student groups will pitch their script ideas in Week 5 for tutor progression feedback.

In this module, students have the opportunity to develop basic scriptwriting skills by focusing specifically on the study and writing of short screenplays. The focus will be on analysis and implementation of narrative devices (including narrative shortcuts and use of sound), development of story and character (and the inter-relationship between the two), and on skills in writing visually and succinctly. The particular character of the ‘short’ screenplay will be examined, analysed and practiced. Scripts will be written with a view that they be made as a short film in Semester 2 for the ‘Producing Drama’ module. A formative task involves an ideas pitch for tutor feedback.

This module offers students the opportunity to gain core competences in professional sound-recording equipment and a chosen piece of editing software for use in both drama and documentary production work. Through intensive hands-on workshops, students’ creative and aesthetic skills are tested and honed through weekly exercises designed to test knowledge and practical application across drama and documentary forms. A formative task informs project development and tutor feedback on progress.

This module offers students the opportunity to gain a core understanding of film genres and their application to filmmaking and to creating meaning within the frame. Students will explore how genre is created through semiology (the use of signs and symbols) within the frame to express a range of meanings and how they support narrative.  A group film project is designed to advance student understanding and development of filmmaking creative practices. Students undertake an individual case-study examining a genre film or a director working within a particular genre. A formative task pitching the group film project idea and planned framic elements affords project progression tutor feedback.

After a thorough introduction detailing the ranging genres, production methods and styles of historical and contemporary documentary films, students will develop their own ideas for documentary subject matter and subsequently shoot their own documentary film. This module will focus on the documentary filmmaking process and is aimed to strengthen practical and theoretical knowledge gained prior to and throughout the filming of the group documentary project. An individual reflexive account provides students opportunity to consider their creative role and the finished project in relation to documentary genre practices. A formative task involves a group idea pitch for tutor feedback.

This module offers students an opportunity to be involved in the production of a short filmed drama from the creation of an original screenplay (as developed in Semester 1, Creating Short Screenplays) to delivery of the final film. Students are able to participate in both the basic creative dimensions of fiction filmmaking including directing performance, cinematography and editing and the organisational dimensions of producing and production management. Working in key roles throughout the pre- production, production and post-production stages of the film making process, students will develop the ability to work creatively and organisationally in groups of 4. The aim of this module is the recognition of filmmaking as a collaborative art form. Students also set up a personal website and an online social presence. A formative task affords project tutor development feedback on project progression.

This module offers students the opportunity to gain a core understanding of how the film director composes and populates the frame in furtherance of creating meaning. Students will explore how a director’s voice can be read as being the ‘author’ of a film through the creation of mise-en-scene. An individual micro-film project is designed to advance student understanding and development of directing a micro-film, one that focuses on to create basic mise-en-scene elements in furtherance of developing an original vision for the script. An individual case-study affords students the opportunity to critically analyse a film director as ‘auteur’. Students undertake a formative task to pitch their story concept and plans for mise-en-scene to the tutor for project progression feedback.

Following on from key core editing techniques learned at Lv 4, students develop a deeper understanding of the theoretical and historical practices and aspects of cinematic editing both as a technical skill and as narrative convention. The module will focus on the development of aesthetic and practical skills applicable to the filmmaking process and how image construction and structure contribute to creating mise-en-scene. After a historical overview, students will examine specific areas of editing through lectures and workshops focusing on areas such as: sensation vs perception, editing of moving image, cutting sound, colour grading and delivery. Students will produce an individual portfolio that demonstrates a range of editing techniques, including narrative and experimental image juxtaposition. Students will research and write a case-study analysing a particular editorial practice or industry practitioner. A formative task affords tutor feedback for project progression.

This module follows on from Level 4 sound studies to develop students’ practical sound production technical skills including location shooting and in post-production through a group project. The module examines the historical and contemporary relevance of sound production in relation to the filmmaking process and how it contributes to mise-en-scene. The focus will be on the practical and aesthetic elements of sound production to understand how it operates and how it contributes to theme. Students will individually reflect on their sound work. A formative task affords project progression tutor feedback.

Building on the Level 4 module Creating Short Screenplays, and on the demands of drama production, students explore the central role of the scriptwriter in the film production process. Whilst acknowledging the collaborative process involved in the development of initial ideas for the screen, students will also have the opportunity to develop their own sustained screenwriting style with an emphasis on the importance of character in the production of engaging screen narratives.  The module is designed to facilitate those students choosing the Level 6 Adaptations option module and those writing a feature length screenplay for their EIS Level 6 Final Major Project. A formative task affords project progression tutor feedback.

Students will explore the theory and practice of rebel filmmaking as it manifests in a range of national and international contexts and across fiction and non-fiction forms. Rebel filmmaking will be understood as a strategy employed by ‘first time’ or transgressive filmmakers to write and direct films outside the ‘mainstream’ context; to subvert traditional production means; to counter/challenge the economics and ideologies of the mainstream cinema; as a product of ‘found’/retro/alternate technologies; as a means for marginalised/oppressed groups to gain access to methods of film production. The module draws on the students’ practical experiences of filmmaking across all the production modules of the programme to make a short ‘rebel’ film that experiments with narrative or documentary practices. Students will self- film a critical reflexive analysis (to-camera) and verbally discuss how they engaged with non- conformist/alternative film practices per their role in the group film and how their themes challenge convention/power systems. A formative task affords a group project pitch to their tutor for project progression feedback.

This module develops cinematographic skills, acquired from Lv4 study, to inform creative authorship and technical camera operation. Students will understand that the conceptual development of visual narrative in film is a vital compliment to cinematographic technical ability. Utlising examples from contemporary cinematographers, students will critical analyse how practice informs the filmmaking process, this will be realised to produce a group short film. Studies and experimentation with genre and semiotics will take place during workshops that explore cinematographic methodologies. These workshops are designed to advance students’ key core skills in lighting, camera, direction and mise-en-scene, inclusive of a written critical analysis. A formative task to present a working script and shot/lighting plan affords project progress tutor feedback.

Building on key core filmmaking and directing skills studied at Lv 4, students will develop and hone particular personal and ideological themes, to directorially draw upon as a filmmaker, in pursuit of creating bold, innovative and forward-looking stories and mise-en-scene. Understanding film as an art form, as a means to developing an original voice, will serve to develop directorial craft skills. A series of ‘master filmmaker’ directors will be analysed to broaden and deepen an understanding of cinematic language for mise-en-scene. Students will research and write a critical analysis examining examples of a particular director’s work (other than those studied on the module). A formative task will afford students feedback on project and research progression.

Students must choose one module:

• Volunteering: Community Filmmaking - 15 Credits
• Work placement - 15 Credits

Students must choose one module:

• Digital Distribution - 15 credits
• Producing Practices - 15 credits
• Culture: High or Low - 15 Credits
• Introduction to Television Studio - 15 credits

The Final Major Project is either a group film production (running time negotiable with supervisor) or an individual feature-length screenplay (80- 100pages); this is an Extended Independent Studies (EIS) project. The practical project is supported by an individual ‘mini-viva’ session (10mins) where students have the opportunity to critically account for, and analyse, their particular creative contribution, research and specialist role on the project to a panel of tutors. Genre and subject area are determined through negotiation with personal project supervisors with whom students will have regular tutorials to discuss creative progress, issues and logistical challenges for the production. 2 Formative tasks are undertaken to receive feedback on the project’s progress across both semesters.

Following on from Lv5 studies on the Digital Distribution and Global Producing: Film Festival, Marketing and Networking options, this module prepares students for post-study employment opportunities. The module aims to provide students with a realistic knowledge of the current employment possibilities within the film industry and develops the important aspects and understanding of industry requirements needed for graduate entry into the film industry. Professional and current practitioners will advise and tutor students on seeking and securing work within a particular sector, ones that compliment skills acquired on the Film Production degree. To hone interpersonal skills, each student will present their completed website and showreel, inclusive of a reflexive accounting of their creative choices. A formative task affords tutor feedback on portfolio progression.

This module develops understanding of how advance post-production techniques are deployed in the modern film production process. Using a wide range of Adobe Creative Cloud applications (Premiere, Photoshop, After Effects etc.) you will create a short film sequence utilising and demonstrating post- production techniques. Seminars and workshops will explore examples of post-production techniques in current use and provide historical context to improve understanding. This module will equip students with advanced skills in post- production appropriate to entry into the film and media production industries. A formative task affords project progression tutor feedback.

Students must choose two modules listed below (only one Value Studies module can be chosen per academic year):

• Advanced Cinematography - 15 Credits
• Animated Shorts - 15 Credits
• Advanced Screenwriting: Adaptations - 15 Credits
• Directing: Framing Ideology - 15 Credits
• Value Studies: The Brain, Huan Nature and Ethics - 15 Credits

Students must choose two modules listed below (only one Value Studies module can be chosen per academic year):

• Third Cinema: Documentary as Resistance - 15 Credits
• Transnational Cinema - 15 Credits
• Creative Post-Production - 15 Credits
• Value Studies: Displaced - 15 Credits