Media Production BA(Hons)

You’ll start developing the skills you’ll need to succeed from the very beginning, as you immerse yourself in the contexts and practices of the current media production and content creation landscape. You’ll explore key concepts around visual and audio production, creative problem-solving and professional practice. 

Modules

Creative Problem Solving

In this module, you’ll explore industry methods, tools and frameworks used in the creative process.

Discovery

You’ll discover the heart of storytelling through filmmaking. Learning fundamental production skills, you’ll look at how we might express original ideas visually and audibly. 

Digital News Lab: Audiovisual Storytelling

In this module, you’ll explore mobile journalism and social media outputs. You'll develop skills in audio, video, still images and social networking, needed to work in the global digital news media environment. 

Agency Life 

This module will give you an overview of agency life, the roles and responsibilities common across agencies and the processes and ways of working you can expect upon graduating.

The Information Age: Exploring the Media Landscape 

This module will support you to study and debate the key trends shaping the contemporary media landscape. Alongside this, you’ll get a working knowledge of key laws and regulations which journalists and communications professionals must work within. 

Represent 

In this module you’ll learn how to develop your ideas, find stories and characters, and decide what creative storytelling you’ll use to form a documentary. You’ll work within industry health and safety, editorial, and diversity guidelines to deal sensitively with your contributors and produce a quality piece of documentary work. 

In year two, you’ll develop and hone your video creation, art direction and copywriting skills while learning the business of content creation web, social media and magazines too. You’ll hear from media professionals from around the globe and get to work alongside colleagues on live briefs. 

Modules

Digital News Lab: Local is Global 

Building on the skills from your first year, you’ll learn how to take your reporting practice into new areas. Focusing on a key current issue, you’ll work individually and collaboratively, putting your storytelling and editing skills to work. 

Media Lab 

You’ll consider a wide range of media channels and their role in delivering effective communications. You’ll examine the pros and cons of different channels and their relevance to varying audiences. This will allow you to develop effective media campaigns that deliver results. 

Global Creators 

This module is designed to bring a diverse range of voices and experiences from media practitioners working and creating across the world into the course, giving you a thorough understanding of the industry and employment pathways that are open to you as practitioners. 

Making Magazines 

Get the opportunity to work on an editorial team to conceive, plan and create a brand new magazine across print and digital mediums. You’ll write a business plan, considering commercial viability, and learn the processes involved in the production, launch and distribution of magazines. 

Collaboration 

In this module you’ll have the opportunity to work with fellow students to realise a creative media project of your own. You’ll apply your core professional skills including negotiation, problem-solving and project management, to initiate, create and deliver a unique project. 

You can choose to take an optional professional placement after your second year on a three-year programme, or after your third year if you’re studying for a degree with an Integrated Foundation Year.  

You’ll be responsible for finding your own placement, with support from the Employability team.  

Choosing this option will enhance your industry experience and skills while studying.  

How you’ll study during your professional placement  

You’ll spend time working in a professional context, as part of a business or organisation. This can be in one role, or up to three, and must be for a minimum of 24 weeks.  

You’ll develop in-demand workplace skills, deepen your insight into industry and grow your network of contacts, all of which could help you get ahead in your career after graduation.  

Throughout this year, you’ll develop a portfolio of work that includes critical self-reflection on what has been learned from the experience. You’ll be required to evidence your experiences, the skills you’ve learned and your professional growth. 

Your final year is all about creating a career-launching portfolio. You’ll work collaboratively and individually on a range of content outputs and contribute to a digital multimedia production project. You'll also sharpen your professional and business development skills, so you’re all set to start making a living from your practice. 

Digital News Lab: Going Live 

This module will solidify all you’ve learned during your degree as you work collaboratively in a deadline-driven newsroom. You’ll take responsibility for organisation and quality control and produce high quality digital news.  

Final Year Project: Development 

You’ll research, plan and develop a self-initiated final year project based on a brand or topic of your choice that reflects your creative passions or professional aspirations. 

Final Year Project: Showcase 

You will create a Final Year Project that will showcase your critical thinking and creative practice. 

Students will have the opportunity of choosing between Final Portfolio and Mini-Documentary for their final module:

Final Portfolio 

You'll work on industry-recognised competition briefs such as CIM Pitch, D&AD New Blood and Creative Conscience to develop a unique portfolio that showcases your knowledge and skills across the three-year degree. 

Mini-Documentary 

In this module you’ll use your planning, storytelling and craft skills to create an extended mini-documentary. Working independently, you’ll refine your idea, tailoring it to your audience, and pitching the concept to a panel following professional processes. 

Why study an Integrated Foundation Year route? 

If you’re taking on a new subject that you haven’t studied in depth before, have been out of education for a while or have a non-standard educational background then an Integrated Foundation Year degree may be the right choice for you. It is a four-year degree with an Integrated Foundation Year to start, which allows you to explore the primary elements of your subject before progressing on to the remaining three years of the BA(Hons) degree. 

What you'll study in your Foundation year

If you choose this pathway, you'll study five core modules in your Foundation year. These are all designed to help you explore the foundational elements of your subject. You'll gain relevant technical skills, learn to experiment and take risks, develop an understanding of professional practice, have opportunities to work across disciplines and collaborate with other students on live project briefs. 

Modules

Explore

You'll begin your foundation year by working collaboratively with others to explore themes of the future. You'll take risks, experiment through play and be supported to break through barriers.

Technique

You'll take subject-specific workshops and develop essential technical and practical skills in your area of study. You'll also enhance your analytical and organisational abilities.

Apply

You'll work with your peer group to think beyond discipline by addressing a societal or global issue. You'll then showcase your work to your peers and deliver an accompanying evaluation of your process.

Industry

You'll enhance your creative and practical skills in your subject specialism by responding to typical industry briefs, underpinned by focused research and experiments. You'll also gain industry insights through guest lectures and workshops.

Launch

You'll develop your unique identity in your specialism through the production of a self-initiated body of work. Your final project will be the bridge to your next year, fully supported by evaluative reviews and critical analysis of the work you have created.

After the Foundation year, you progress into Year One of the full three-year degree, equipped with a deeper knowledge of your subject, a clear understanding of your strengths, and develop a practical and technical skillset and the confidence to excel in your chosen subject. 

If you apply for and enrol onto a degree with an Integrated Foundation Year, you’ll have the option to switch onto a five-year version including a placement year. That means you’ll complete the first three years of your course before completing a placement in industry in your fourth year and returning to Falmouth for the fifth year of your programme. 

The Integrated Foundation Year pathway for this course is new for entry year 2023 and subject to validation.

Through skills development workshops, masterclasses and interactive seminars, supported by keynote lectures, you'll develop briefing, concepting, strategy, research, idea development and planning skills. Mirroring industry, you'll then put these skills into practice as you work on real-world projects individually and in teams. Throughout your Media Production degree, you'll benefit from the course team's film, television, advertising and journalism connections. 

At Falmouth, we use a 'digitally enhanced learning & teaching' approach. Your experience will always be predominantly in-person, including seminars, tutorials and studio teaching, with some, more targeted elements, being online either live (synchronous) or pre-recorded (asynchronous). You can read more here.

100% of your assessment will be coursework. There are no exams as part of this course.  

Assessment methods

Assessments can take many forms, including: 

• Practical projects 
• Presentations 
• Portfolios 
• Short essays 
• Integrated Foundation Year assessments are 100% coursework based 

Mirroring the industry, we encourage self-evaluation at the end of each project and support this via personal development plans.