BA (Hons) Film and Media Production top-up
Course Overview
The media and creative industries are flourishing and the North West is the key digital powerhouse outside of London. Traditional career routes in areas such as film and TV continue to seek new recruits, but exciting opportunities are also available with the broad range of organisations that now need moving images for their websites, social media platforms and promotional adverts. They want people who can create new and interesting content using their great storytelling skills and sound knowledge of the production process and workflow. This course aims to prepare you for a career in this exciting sector and offers transferable employability skills such as resilience, adaptability and team-working that are highly attractive to employers.Your learning on this highly practical digital media production course is underpinned by critical and theoretical study, putting story at the heart of production. Our dedicated industry-experienced staff will support you to develop honours-level academic and research skills, and guide you as you expand your experience and outlook in relation to the world of film, media and the digital creative industries. We’ll also help cultivate your critical thinking skills, enabling you to challenge, question and explore the world around you and feed this into your creative work.
Our experienced team take pride in getting to know our students as individuals, and you can become part of our welcoming and supportive production family. Offering you the chance to share in our immense wealth of award winning industry experience, this course allows you to explore the various gateways into the vibrant media industry in North West England.
Highlights
- The Guardian University Guide 2022 ranks our Film Production and Photography courses as fourth in the UK for student-to-staff ratio, so you can be assured that we offer you excellent access to individual tutor support and small group teaching.
- Our lecturers have first-hand experience across a range of creative media and our excellent industry contacts mean we can offer regular guest lectures from professionals in the industry.
- You’ll have access to first-rate broadcast-quality digital equipment.
- We provide production budgets for student films to cover essential costs, and bring in professional expertise to advise and support you.
- If you have no prior industry experience, we offer you the chance to undertake a work placement module.
- We’ll encourage you to take part in screenwriting competitions, provide opportunities for festival submissions and festival involvement, and help you build your industry contacts.
Key Features
- Eight dedicated video edit suites with sound processing capability.
- Computer facilities for each student with dedicated media software.
- Two fully-equipped studio facilities with lighting rigs, screens and equipment.
- Sound recording facilities.
- Professional HD film production equipment and a supply of ancillary equipment for professional production.
- Guides for each individual module provide information about the programme.
Entry Requirements
- You’re normally expected to have successfully completed a relevant qualification at Level HE5, such as a Foundation Degree or Higher National Diploma (HND), or a professional qualification at an equivalent level.
- You'll be required to attend an interview and provide a portfolio of appropriate work.
- If English isn’t your first language, you’ll also need IELTS 6.0 with no less than 5.5 in any band (or equivalent). We also accept a range of other English language qualifications – please visit our English Language Requirements web page for more details.
Where changes are made to material information contained in this course description or a decision is taken to suspend a course between the offer of admissions and enrolment, we will inform applicants at the earliest possible opportunity and will outline the various options available to the applicant.
Career Opportunities
This top-up course is designed to prepare you for creative positions in the moving image industry, and offers you in-depth knowledge of working in film, TV and multi-platform formats. Our graduates possess a wide range of technical and creative skills and are ready to challenge, question and explore what’s possible in moving image media.
A key part of the course is your chance to benefit from a creative industries placement (if you have no prior industry experience) and extracurricular opportunities to help build appealing CVs, showreels and portfolios in preparation for employment.
As a graduate, you’ll possess a range of transferable skills such as creativity, communication skills, teamwork, managing deadlines, critical analysis, and commercial and cultural awareness.
What can I do with this qualification?
Film and Media Production graduates typically enter careers in the media, cultural and creative industries. Areas of work can include television and radio, film and video, digital media, journalism, writing and publishing, PR and media practice. Some of our graduates have set up their own companies or worked collaboratively with small production companies. Others have gone on to make films that have won accolades in film festivals around the world.
After graduation, you could choose to continue your studies by pursuing an MA or PhD in a variety of fields; for example, PR and communications, digital marketing, publishing, film production and journalism.
Alternative career options
Graduates can also use the qualification as a stepping-stone to enter a range of other careers. For some of these roles, relevant experience or postgraduate study may be required. Possible roles include:
- Arts administration
- Event organisation
- Teaching
- Local government
- Advertising and marketing
- Journalism
- PR consultancy
- Communications
- Publishing
Fees & Funding
Home/EU Fees
No fee information is currently available, please contact Student Data Management on 01204 903059 or SDMenquiries@bolton.ac.uk for more information
International Fees
No fee information is currently available, please contact Student Data Management on 01204 903059 or SDMenquiries@bolton.ac.uk for more information
Bursaries
Important note regarding tuition fees for the 2024-25 academic year: EU nationals who meet residency requirements (have settled or pre-settled status) may be eligible for 'Home' fee status. If you do not meet these residency requirements, overseas fees will apply. Irish citizens living in the UK or Ireland will be eligible for 'Home' fee status under the Common Travel Area arrangement. Please read the student finance for EU students web page on www.gov.uk for information.
The fees for a student's course of study will be set for the normal duration of that course subject only to inflationary increases – measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) recorded in March each year to take effect for subsequent start dates.
How to apply
Home Applicants
Course application details are unavailable at present
International Applicants
Course application details are unavailable at present
Partner Organisation Applicants
Please contact Admissions by telephone on 01204 903903 or email enquiries@bolton.ac.uk
Admissions
University of Bolton
Deane Road
Bolton, BL3 5AB
United Kingdom
Tel: 01204 903903
Email: enquiries@bolton.ac.uk
Teaching & Assessment
Much of the work involved in this course is based around practical media projects. You’ll be expected to create different types of content as well as write essays, presentations and pitches. Some online course activities are student-generated and controlled to resemble the practices you are likely to encounter in the media industries.
We place emphasis on group work, activity-based assignments, workshops, demonstrations, projects and guided independent study. Some of the modules will be delivered in a more conventional way through classes, lectures and presentations. You’ll be taught by tutors who have extensive industry experience, and by specialist guest lecturers.
You’ll also be expected to devote a significant amount of time to independent study, and our online resources will assist you with this. Assignments will require time outside of lessons to complete. Work-based learning is a key element of the course, and the completion of industry briefs and professional quality work are designed to ensure you are ready for employment when you graduate.
There are no examinations. All assessment is through coursework. You can expect formative assessment to help you learn and develop your knowledge and skills and summative assessment on which you’ll be graded. Your summative assessment briefs will contain tasks such as making films, writing essays and reports, writing scripts and outlines, giving presentations and pitches, carrying out practical exercises and work-placements (if you have no prior experience).
Modules
The modules listed below may be a mixture of compulsory and optional. You may not have the opportunity to study all the modules shown as part of the course.
- Pre Production Research and Planning
- Major Project
- Contextualising Theory
- Professional Practice
- Short-form Commission
- Industry Experience
Assessment methods
| Level | Assessment method |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | Coursework 82% Practical exams 18% |
Learning Activities
| Level | Activity |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | Guided independent study 72% Scheduled learning and teaching activities 28% |
The university will use all reasonable endeavours to deliver your course as described in its published material and the programme specification for the academic year in which you begin your course. The university considers changes to courses very carefully and the university will minimise any changes. Please be aware that our courses are subject to review on an ongoing basis and changes may be necessary due to legitimate staffing, financial, regulatory and academic reasons. The content of course modules and mode of associated assessments may be updated on an annual basis. This is to ensure that all modules are up-to-date and responsive to employment and sector needs. The published course material and the programme specification contain indicative ‘optional modules’ that may be subject to change due to circumstances outside of our control. For this reason, we cannot guarantee to run any specific optional module.
