CREATIVE MEDIA PRACTICES (I) - 2025/6

Module Overview

This module is about consolidating students’ existing skills and talents, and enhancing these with areas of creative media production in which they may be less familiar. The intention is to develop a broad armoury of aptitudes and proficiencies, enabling students to realise an expanded range of contemporary media projects, drawing on both traditional and evolving future techniques and technologies.

To achieve this, students undertake a series of specialist workshops which span contemporary narrative media production, with an emphasis on current innovative techniques.

The module will be assessed through the development of a cumulative portfolio. Students submit outputs from the workshops as a portfolio and accompany this with a reflective synopsis on their learning and development.

The skills and knowledge acquired in this module are cumulative and can be applied to subsequent modules and workshops over the course of the Masters programme.

Module provider

Music & Media

Module Leader

WEINBREN Jon (Music & Med)

Number of Credits: 30

ECTS Credits: 15

Framework: FHEQ Level 7

Module cap (Maximum number of students): 20

Module Availability

Semester 1

Prerequisites / Co-requisites

None

Module content

Indicative content includes:

• 2D Animation


• 3D Modelling and Animation


• Procedural Character Creation


• Script and Story Development


• Live Action: Script / Directing / Performance


• Realtime Graphics for Moving Image

Assessment pattern

Alternative Assessment

N/A

Assessment Strategy

The assessment strategy is designed to provide students with the opportunity to demonstrate creative and technical proficiency with tools and techniques covered by the module, as applied to their creative portfolio.

  Summative assessment:

• Portfolio
   

  Formative assessment and feedback

Formative assessment is given through timetabled group critiques and individual tutorials, as well as more informally during workshops sessions. Students can discuss and develop both creative and technical aspects of their work through regular open interaction with tutors and peers, as well as through specific tutorial sessions with specialists.

 

Module aims

• - Develop students proficiencies in the latest 3D digital content workflows, including character creation, object modelling, 3D animation and performance capture techniques.
• - Develop students skills in 2D traditional and digital animation techniques used in contemporary film and animation production.
• - Develop students skills and creative techniques to be applied to narrative filmmaking, including story development, working with actors, camera, lighting, production design, and other on-set departments and specialisms.
• - Develop students skills in script and story development for moving image media.
• - Support students further development of creative and production skills in all areas of moving image media
• - Advance students capabilities in research and development for moving image media content creation.

Learning outcomes

Methods of Teaching / Learning

The learning and teaching strategy is designed to equip all students with a solid level of expertise in modern, time-efficient film, animation and digital media technologies around which the MA FADA is based. It is expected that most students will enter the programme already proficient in some of the relevant areas but may have gaps in their knowledge or be less up-to-date in certain production techniques and media formats. Thus students will enjoy both consolidation and enhancement, resulting in the ability to apply appropriate creative and technical solutions to a wide range of media storytelling needs and ambitions.

Module content will be delivered through a combination of:

• Demos, creative exercises (‘workshops’)


• Group seminars, presentations, critiques (‘seminars’)


• Individual tutorials (‘tutorials’)

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: DMAM002

Other information

Embedded alongside the specific knowledge, skills, abilities and experiences facilitated by this module are more general attributes which the university has identified as an ambition to develop in all students across all subjects and disciplines on offer. These are:-

• Employability
• Resourceful and Resilience
• Digital Capabilities
• Sustainability
• Global Cultural Awareness

The following is an account of how this module addresses these ‘pillars’.

Employability

In general the MA Film, Animation and Digital Arts programme takes on students who are already eminently employable within the creative media industries, as they have most often developed a range of skills, both through previous undergraduate qualifications and through professional practice. The FADA programme boosts employability, raises the level at which students can gain positions and roles within the industry on graduation, and addresses well documented industry skills gaps. This module is delivered by tutors and specialists with significant industry experience and contacts, and the notion of ‘professional practice’ within a creative studio environment is a core attribute of the whole course and its components. The module developed a range of proficiencies appropriate to live action film, animation, games, and other associated areas of the media industries, by providing up-to-the-minute knowledge and understanding of tools and techniques used everyday in these fields at professional level. Equally important for employability within these areas (and often overlooked) is the development of ‘personability’: so that employers, collaborators, funders and commissioners want to work with you. We develop this by enabling students to work collaboratively and collegiately, in a supportive ‘studio-like’ environment in which we all work together to realise creative goals. We also facilitate plenty of networking opportunities, so that students get to meet and interact with future potential employers, collaborators, funders and commissioners. We also assist students to enter events and festivals so that their work is promoted and ‘seen’, widening opportunities and providing valuable peer esteem.

Resourcefulness and Resilience

Like others on the MA FADA programme, this module provides students with a number of challenges which reflect the current state of the art. Students need to respond to these with inventiveness and flexibility, and are often required to research their own solutions to given problems. The greatest resource for students on a postgraduate programme such as FADA is each other, and we encourage students to pool their knowledge and work together to come up with innovative methods to achieve a particular creative or technical goal. The studio environment and unfettered access to facilities and software facilitates this.

Digital Capabilities

The FADA programme is built on the very latest techniques and technologies, thus ‘digital capabilities’ very much comes with the territory. Contemporary Media Production is an inherently ‘digital’ affair of course, although we include more traditional techniques such as drawn animation, and drawing practice, as part of the offering.

 

Sustainability

It is incumbent on us all to reduce carbon footprints, and the film, animation and digital arts sector is no different. On all FADA modules, students are made aware of sustainable production practices both on-set and behind the computer. Students are shown best practices such as LED-based lighting, virtual production technologies to minimise crew and talent travel, recycling of sets and other materials, better transport choices, minimising of waste, and awareness of environmental and social effects on local communities and landscapes. These are embedded in various current industry initiatives such as BAFTA Albert, the ‘Screen New Deal’ production sustainability plan, and others. Furthermore, from a content viewpoint, many of the creative projects developed by students on the programme address environment and sustainability issues as part of their subject matter. We also work closely with the University of Surrey’s Institute for Sustainability to explore and promote the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals.

Global Cutural Awareness

The FADA programme consists of a diverse community of practitioners reflected in both the student cohort and the associates and specialist tutors brought in to assist in the delivery of this and other modules. We promote a convivial atmosphere, and as highly internationalised group, awareness of global cultures and diversities is an inherent part of the offering.

 

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 2025/6 academic year.