PROFESSIONAL PROJECTS PORTFOLIO - 2023/4

Module Overview

This module offers you the opportunity to choose your own assignments from a selection of industry briefs and this portfolio will also add to the variety of work available for your show reel that you will complete in this module. 

The module is modeled on real media projects that you would find as a freelance media professional.  The assignment options may change but they will range from event documentaries, required by many companies as part of their marketing or to commemorate an occasion like a wedding.  Film competitions are offered in the assignment choice and some students have gone on to win both national and international competitions as part of this module.  You will also learn more about animation and this can be applied to a title sequence or short animation for the project options.  As we are in the same department as so many talented musicians, the module can offer a real opportunity to plan and film a music video to a professional standard.  The assignments will vary but will include projects that develop skills for professionally paid work.

For many production roles a show reel is important for future freelance work so it is included in the assessment so you have a show reel ready for any future employer which can cover creative, technical and craft skills depending on your area of interest.

Module provider

Music & Media

Module Leader

PRATT Susan (Music & Med)

Number of Credits: 15

ECTS Credits: 7.5

Framework: FHEQ Level 5

Module cap (Maximum number of students): N/A

Module Availability

Semester 2

Prerequisites / Co-requisites

FVP1014 - Video fundamentals A  FVP1008 - Film Production 

Module content

Indicative content includes:

• Familiarity with post production effects, animation and grading software


• Professional standard of video editing on industry standard software


• Introduction to Animation


• Working professionally on set


• Delivering a media production from a project brief


• Introduction to documentary making


• Making a music video


• Production for a sustainable future


• Audience demographic and client requirements applied to production aims


• Awareness of Copyright


• Production management


• Health and Safety


• Delivering to a deadline


• Postproduction workflow


• Foley and sound mixing delivery


• Delivery formats

Assessment pattern

Alternative Assessment

N/A

Assessment Strategy

The assessment strategy is designed to provide students the opportunity to use their creative media skills for professional creative briefs and combine their project management skills to deliver a professional media production. The presentation simulates a professional creative environment where the client would review the direction of the production and give feedback to improve the final production to adhere to the brief, so students experience real life project development.

Student can choose which of the creative briefs they submit for coursework 1 and 2 so they can select which industry skills they want to develop further.

Student reflection on their creative production enables demonstration of the limitations of their production and provides an opportunity to use reflective processes to review their project further and to suggest other ideas to improve their professional production.


Thus, the summative assessment for this module consists of:

• Coursework 1 – creative media brief 1 and reflection report (addresses Learning Outcomes 1,2,3,4,5, 6  and 7).


• Coursework 2 – creative media brief 2 and reflective report  (addresses Learning Outcomes 1,2,3,4,5,6 and 7).


• Coursework 3 – show reel  (addresses Learning Outcomes 1,2,4,5,6 and 7)

Formative assessment

Each student must present their project idea through an oral presentation for the media production that will be submitted. This is similar to an industry client review of a professional production.

There will be formative assessment at each workshop and on the early submission of work.
Feedback
Oral feedback will be delivered at the time of the presentation. In addition, more

feedback is delivered at each workshop session to maintain the quality of the professional production.

Every student is encouraged to submit their work early to receive either written feedback or a feedback tutorial

Module aims

• Develop students' creative media skills to produce professional standard narrative and communication for their media production.
• Expand students' production techniques, editing, animation and post production skills to produce creative media for professional briefs
• Advance production planning and management skills to deliver media projects with an awareness of delivery format
• Provide opportunities for students to research and apply good design practice with regard to successful media projects and analyse the quality of the final production
• Use design creative skills and technical skills to compile a show reel to enable students to demonstrate competencies in their chosen specialist area.

Learning outcomes

Methods of Teaching / Learning

The learning and teaching strategy is designed to Equip students to deliver media productions to successfully meet a professional creative brief. The module will incorporate your previous knowledge of filming, editing, sound, storytelling and you will gain new digital techniques in animation to fulfil the final productions. This module gives you the opportunity to choose which project area you want to master and improve your skills and techniques for that project.

The productions will give you the opportunity to research the content relevant for the production and audience and encompass that content into the narrative.

The learning and teaching methods include:

• lectures to introduce production techniques which will develop employable industry  skills, awareness of audience demographic and sustainability in production.


• Workshops will develop new post production techniques and you will put them into the contest of the professional projects


• Possibility of visiting industry guests who introduce creative briefs, workshops introducing animation and post production techniques with access to industry standard software.


• Feedback workshops to review, critique and improve productions

Indicated Lecture Hours (which may also include seminars, tutorials, workshops and other contact time) are approximate and may include in-class tests where one or more of these are an assessment on the module. In-class tests are scheduled/organised separately to taught content and will be published on to student personal timetables, where they apply to taken modules, as soon as they are finalised by central administration. This will usually be after the initial publication of the teaching timetable for the relevant semester.

Reading list

https://readinglists.surrey.ac.uk
Upon accessing the reading list, please search for the module using the module code: FVP2008

Other information

The Department of Music and Media is committed to developing graduates with attributes encompassing employability, digital skills, global and culture awareness, sustainability as it relates to media production and broadcast engineering and, finally, resourcefulness and resilience.

Employability: this module allows students to both understand, and actively participate in, a range of professional projects that prepare them for working in industry. The projects reflect creative briefs that students would find if they were employed by a client. Some students have gone onto placements that require these skills and others have won competitions that was at the heart of the assignment. This shows the quality of the production and techniques encouraged  within the module. Students will be required to  further develop critical  thinking, reasoning,  decision-making,  resourcefulness, collaboration, leadership, and other transferable skills,  that students acquire  and practice attributes that  will  be  attractive  to  employers  in  this  field.  The focus of  the assessment  strategy  will  help  to  prepare  students  for the  realities of the  world  of  work  as it sets professional projects that students can be employed to complete in the future.  They also lead to possible skills that could lead to a placement year of and graduate work.

Resourcefulness and Resilience: Students are guided to develop the ability to reflect, evaluate, adapt, and respond flexibly to unforeseen circumstances throughout the module and particularly in their development of their project ideas, working around problems in pre-production, on set and in the editing of the final production, to reduce the impact of previous mistakes or errors. Students also reflect on their experiences through a self-reflective report on the project, which is also an opportunity to review their own resilience and resourcefulness.

Digital capabilities: Students are shown how to use a wide range of online and stand-alone digitally-enabled and industry-standard tools. These include software such as Adobe Premiere Pro, Davinci Resolve, Adobe After effects, Pro Tools and other industry software that can be used in post production. Students have learnt to set up the recording formats and settings for using professional video cameras and will have to media manage their projects to deliver the final productions in the correct format. Students will access learning materials through Surreylearn the virtual learning platform where material is available for them to develop their knowledge and professional skills.  During the module students will deliver a presentation and are supported to learn appropriate software to accompany the presentation. Additional tutorials may be delivered over teams ensuring the students are accustomed to online environments.

Sustainability: By relating to industry standards of sustainability in media production, the module introduces to the global challenges of our era that require production to reduce the production of greenhouse gasses and to be aware of how their production content can contribute to the attitude of viewers to this topic. So they can embed this in some of the productions and their placement year or employment as they go forward.

Global and cultural capabilities: Students will develop an awareness of the demographic of their proposed audience, demonstrate cultural awareness of how their production could address different demographics for the purpose of the production aims. The module will nurture awareness of the narrative to clearly  reflect cultural viewpoints. Also to be aware on location of any sensitivities that may need to be included in production planning.

Programmes this module appears in

Please note that the information detailed within this record is accurate at the time of publishing and may be subject to change. This record contains information for the most up to date version of the programme / module for the 2023/4 academic year.