BA (Hons) Digital Film Production

• Digital Film Production: Introduction Part One (Mandatory)

This module introduces creative digital filmmaking practice and is designed to encourage a flexible, informed, imaginative and reflective approach to practical work. Above all, this module introduces students to the basics of camera, lighting, sound and post-production so that good working practices are established to aid the student’s progression over the three-year course.

• Digital Film Production: Introduction Part Two (Mandatory)

This module reinforces and develops critical filmmaking skills learnt in Digital Film Production: Introduction Part One, emphasising the creation and realisation of a single project. Throughout the module, students will be encouraged to adopt an ‘ideas-led’ approach to filmmaking, drawing and building upon their work in the Developing Screen Ideas module.

• Film Studies One: Analysis and Issues (Mandatory)

This introductory module is designed to stimulate the student’s intellectual curiosity. It will develop the student’s critical knowledge and skills base in ways which complement and inform their conceptual and practical work. The first six weeks focus on the crucial analysis of mise-en-scene, cinematography, sound and editing. In the module's second half, students investigate issues of race and representation, with particular reference to mainstream American cinema.

• Film Studies Two: Film History (Mandatory)

This introductory module is coupled with and follows directly from Film Studies One. As such, it continues to develop students' critical knowledge and skills base in ways which complement and inform their conceptual and practical work. The module introduces Film History as an academic discipline, provides the student with a toolkit of concepts for the close analysis of a range of film texts and genres and sets the student on the path of historical and contextual enquiry through the study of a diverse range of films from around the world.

• Audio One: Production Sound (Mandatory)

During this module, students learn the fundamentals of recording sound for pictures and the role of the sound mixer in film production. By shooting their own short films, students learn how to shoot single-system and double-system footage and log, synchronise and edit that footage. 

• Developing Screen Ideas (Mandatory)

This module introduces students to the developmental process in filmmaking and is fundamentally concerned with generating ideas and the creative techniques involved in their realisation. Initially, students explore key concepts and practices in screenwriting, critically analysing narrative structure, story types and themes, conflict, action, character, dialogue, genre and style. This critical study is complemented by screenwriting tasks on action, character, dialogue and genre, which will be included in students’ portfolios.

• Researching Film: Theories and Methods (Mandatory)

The module addresses theoretical and critical approaches to the study of film texts. It provides a preparation for students’ independent research at Level 6 when formulating their research proposal for the Dissertation.  Focusing on a range of film theories, approaches and methods which have been influential in the development of Film as a field of academic study will enable students to examine various ideas, assumptions and procedures and try them out on a diverse range of films.  
 

• Screenwriting: The Ten-Minute Short (Mandatory)

This module explores the theory and practice of writing for the screen, specifically the ten-minute short.  Students will engage with vital practical manuals and critical studies of the screenwriting process and study a range of globally diverse shorts.  The culmination of this work will be the production of a ten-page screenplay which will be put forward for selection to be made in the level five Digital Film Production: Drama module in semester two.

• Avant-garde and Experimental Film (Mandatory)

This module enables students to explore alternatives to mainstream cinema which have attracted the label avant-garde, experimental, underground or alternative. Building on work done in previous critical and practical modules and complementing the concurrent Level 5 ones, the module aims to expand students’ theoretical, critical, practical and creative horizons by engaging them with a range of work and filmmaking modes unfamiliar.

• Digital Film Production: Documentary (Mandatory)

This module develops the Level 4 digital film work by deepening students’ engagement with the medium through practical engagement with the many different forms of documentary storytelling. Analysis of contrasting examples from the practice across several continents combined with short exercises will culminate in producing a documentary short film to be made in small groups.

• Digital Film Production: Drama (Mandatory)

Students work in small crews to produce ten-minute short films based on the screenplays written in the Screenwriting: The Ten-Minute Short module. Students develop their understanding and knowledge of narrative-based drama and the possibilities and limitations of the short film form.  Students are encouraged to use the form innovatively and produce conceptually and visually creative content. 

• Audio Two: Postproduction Sound (Mandatory)

This module introduces the fundamental concepts, methodologies and techniques of audio postproduction for film. In the first assignment, students design a soundtrack for a short animated film extract using Pro Tools software, applying level balancing, stereo imaging, equalization, and reverb to tracks they have imported and synchronised to the picture.  Their second practical project requires them to: write, shoot and edit a short, ‘sound-driven’ film. By putting this film through audio postproduction, students are suitably equipped to record, edit and engineer the soundtracks for their own and each other’s films during the remainder of their studies and beyond.

• Dissertation (Mandatory)

This year-long module represents the culmination of students’ critical development in the course. It allows students to explore a chosen area of Film Studies. They design and carry out a sustained and coherent piece of independent research in an area of scholarship they wish to pursue.

• Digital Film Production: Final Project (Mandatory)

This module culminates students’ conceptual, practical and creative development in the course. Students are expected to critically evaluate the ideas generated in the Level 6 Development and Pre-production: Final Project module to select the most original and physically feasible concept for a film they will make independently on digital cinema. 

• Professional Practice (Mandatory)

This module allows students to undertake professional digital film and client work placement. Through the wide variety of opportunities available, students develop the knowledge and skills that underpin their own creative, professional and personal self-development. Building on Level 4 and 5 production modules, this module prepares students for professional life after graduation. It establishes the skills and resources needed to develop a sustainable practice and work in either a self-employed or employed capacity.

• Development and Pre-production: Project (Mandatory)

This module builds on students’ knowledge of the development and pre-production processes in filmmaking. It is fundamentally concerned with generating ideas and the creative and practical techniques involved in their realisation. Students develop ideas for a short drama, documentary or experimental film, choosing which one(s) they wish to progress and produce as their final project in semester two.