UDFASPHO - BA Fashion Photography

The BA Fashion Photography degree encourages students to approach photographic practices through challenging and exciting projects, fostering an in-depth understanding of visual aesthetics, concepts, and techniques of image production, distribution and consumption. Students gain proficient knowledge of conceptual and technical skills essential in today’s fast-paced, image-led world, developing innovative and highly creative work through industry-facing projects. We offer strong links with practitioners and the course features portfolio reviews, visiting lecturers, exhibitions and studio visits.
The course has been designed in consultation with students and employers in order to ensure that it meets the aspirations of our students and the demands of the contemporary employment environment. It aligns with the University’s Strategic Plan, the Education for Social Justice Framework and Student Partnership Agreement in promoting accessible and inclusive education in an environment that respects and values the identities of our students and accommodates diversity in all its forms. Consideration has been given to the QAA Subject Benchmark Statement for Art & Design (2019), the QAA Higher Education Qualifications Framework and the University’s Academic Regulations.

The course is highly student centred and promotes individualised learning opportunities and student choice in curriculum and approach to study. Employability is fostered through learning from direct experience and real-world contact with external partners and live project opportunities. Independent and critical thinking and an awareness of our social responsibility to consider the impact of our decision and actions is fundamental to the course’s principles. It is designed to create a supportive, engaging, enjoyable, deep and creatively and professionally relevant learning experience. It will allow you to construct a unique and personal creative identity making photography that you are proud of based on your interests, concerns, ideas, experiences, background and identity. We will work together with you as a community to understand and develop the best version of yourself as a creative and professional practitioner.

The professional level facilities will give the student access to and experience of a wide range of approaches to image making. Our facilities are complimented by excellent industry standard range of digital cameras and post production facilities. The facilities will also give students an exciting opportunity to make work with a combination of traditional analogue and digital processes that challenge and expand the old boundaries of photography as a medium in contemporary contexts.

Graduates will have developed knowledge and understanding of contemporary and historic discourse and practices relevant to fashion photography and the expanded field. They will understand how these may be applied with investigation and experimentation with photographic and creative processes in order to create lens-based works relevant to the principles and expectations of contemporary practice.

Graduates will develop strong critical, evaluative and analytical abilities, understanding how to use convergent and divergent forms of thinking in order to address, assess, question and challenge social, ethical, environmental and economic issues within their own work and the work of others. They will be able to set their work within critical and cultural debates whilst considering the needs and perspectives of diverse specialist and non-specialist audiences. Teaching and learning on the course will also allow students to engage with practices such as fashion styling, advertising and art direction, exploring a broad range of approaches to the photographic industry.

Graduates will have developed a set of photographic, lens-based and other creative skills appropriate to their creative and professional aspirations, that will allow them to pursue the opportunities available upon graduation.

On completing the course graduates will have developed a strong set of transferable skills that will enable them to have the resilience to plan, engage in, manage, self-motivate and drive forward professional level careers. They will have developed the necessary skills and understanding to communicate and to work effectively and collaboratively in a variety of professional settings.

Demonstrate confidence, resilience, ambition and creativity and will act as inclusive, collaborative and socially responsible practitioners/professionals in their discipline.

Course learning outcomes will normally address the following categories of learning and achievement, in a reasonable balance, as appropriate:

• Knowledge and understanding
• Cognitive intellectual abilities
• Behaviours and values
• Transferable skills,
• Subject specific skills

On completion of the BA Photography course, the student will be able to:

Knowledge and Understanding
1. recognise the relationship existing between culture, politics and the economy both historically and contemporaneously and its relevance to concepts, principles and theories of photography (CA5, CA6);
2. describe, explore, test and challenge a range of methods of enquiry associated with photographic process (CA1, CA2, CA5);
3. assimilate into practice the principles, codes and ethics necessary to the practice of photography (CA3, CA4);

Cognitive Intellectual Abilities
4. employ a range of intellectual skills that contribute to both convergent and divergent forms of thinking, observation, investigation, research and analysis, independently appraising and articulating reasoned arguments to select, organise, structure, reference and formulate responses to historical, theoretical, practice-based or technical questions about photography (CA2, CA6, CA8);
5. apply and test photography ideas by understanding the context and critical issues that surround them and make decisions in the practice of photography based upon social, ethical, environmental and economic issues (CA2, CA3, CA8);
6. consider the needs and views of the photography viewer, audience, community, culture or wider public and assimilate them in relation to specific photography projects, attending talks and events to analyse, appraise and challenge how contemporaries address these needs and views (CA3, CA8);

Transferable Skills
7. interact collaboratively on photography projects with other photographers, associated professionals, community, as well the wider public (CA7, CA9, CA10); 8. communicate photography ideas, principles and concepts effectively by oral, written and visual means with clarity and confidence (CA4, CA9);
9. exercise self-directed management skills in photography, including time management, team negotiation and collaboration (CA10, CA11);

Subject-Specific Practical Skills
10. organise and apply tools, equipment, materials and techniques relating to photography, using both analogue and digital techniques (CA7, CA8);
11. develop employability and entrepreneurial skills to effectively communicate, present, publish and exhibit project work made by photographers, understanding the roles and expertise of the extended team within the world of photography (CA2, CA9); 12. exhibit understanding of the roles and expertise of the extended team within the photography sector and work effectively in that context, enabling continuous self- development (CA4, CA10, CA11).

Subject Benchmark Statement
Art and Design

http://www.qaa.ac.uk/docs/qaa/subject-benchmark-statements/sbs-art-and-design-17.pdf?sfvrsn=71eef781_22)

The assessment strategy for the course has been designed holistically, to ensure fairness, accessibility and inclusivity as well as manageable timing, workloads and clarity of expectations for students, and to avoid duplication of assessment of learning outcomes. Where appropriate, students are engaged as partners in the design of their assessments.

The assessment regimes for the modules and tasks are designed together with the briefs, prior to the start of the year, considering student, external examiner, professional collaborator and colleague feedback from previous instances. The requirements of briefs and their components, the assessment criteria, grading scheme and descriptors are published and explained to students at the start of the year and are designed to be used as consistently as possible, to avoid unnecessary complication.

In every case, there is required formative assessment and feedback prior to summative assessment at set points. This is recorded so that it can be used by both students and staff to track further progress and engage support where it is required. Feedback follows good pedagogic practice in that it is constructed as ‘feed-forward’, with a focus on specific actions and strategies as to how to improve, not only on what requires improvement.

Students are informed of the procedures for first, second and parity marking, and external examiner scrutiny of the assessment process and marks, to ensure that they understand and have confidence in the probity of the process and security of the final marks. Additionally, the course engages in Subject and School parity exercises to ensure that assessment standards are consistent.

All the BA Fashion Photography course's assessment and feedback practices are consistently informed by reflection, consideration of professional practice, as well as subject-specific and educational scholarship. Staff and students typically engage in constructive dialogue to promote a shared understanding of the basis on which academic judgements are made. All fashion photography students are provided with regular opportunities to develop an understanding of best academic practice and the necessary skills to demonstrate it.
The volume, timing and nature of assessments enable students to demonstrate the extent to which they have achieved the intended learning outcomes and formative assessment is clearly designed to support students in developing toward summative assessment.

Feedback on assessment is timely, constructive and developmental and all processes for marking assessments and for moderating marks are clearly articulated and consistently operated by all those involved in the assessment process.

Work-based learning is embedded in the course and students are actively supported in seeking opportunities for work-related learning relevant to a diverse range of practices in the current landscape of fashion photography.

The course recognises and responds to changes in the professional landscape, engaging with the role of the fashion photographer as an artist, auteur, creative storyteller and witness of our times, promoting an eclectic approach to fashion photography and the applied field.
The course follows the example of progressive agencies working within the commercial advertising, editorial and fashion sectors that engage with photographic artists and fashion photographers whose work is equally valued by publishers, galleries and public institutions.

You will have the opportunity to take part in both national and international study visits and meet and receive feedback from photographers and individuals working within the creative sector. You will experience live briefs, publish your work in printed magazines, show work in public exhibitions as well as engage with community arts events, commercial commissions, competitions and other work-related opportunities that are offered through the many organisations, businesses, galleries, groups, and individuals with whom the course’ team as well as the university have strong links.

All tutors and lecturers contributing to the course are practitioners who share their knowledge and experience with students throughout their course of study. The flexible practice-led model of delivery for the course means that evolving opportunities for work-related learning through collaboration with external companies, agencies, institutions, competitions and professionals are taken up as they arise.

Students’ understanding of professional standards, ethics and expectations builds as they progress from level to level and supports them in developing an understanding of possible career paths and fosters individual career aspirations.
During their final year, students are expected to work independently towards the completion of a professional portfolio of practical lens-based work, culminating in the annual summer show and associated events. Furthermore, they develop an in-depth understanding of the business and marketing practices relevant to fashion photography, understanding the various roles within an extended fashion team (such as photographer, stylist, agent, model, client) and the role of different audiences.

ACADEMIC PROGRESSION: As a condition of progressing from Level 4 to Level 5 and from Level 5 to Level 6, students are required to have gained 120 credits per level, that is, by achieving pass marks (40% or above) in all four modules in the preceding level of study.

COURSE COMPLETION
Level 6: to achieve an honours degree award on this course, students must have completed
and passed each Level 6 module at 40% or above.

PART-TIME MODE OF STUDY
Part-time study is defined as 60 credits per year. Consequently, in part-time mode, the duration of study for a 360-credit degree will be 6 years. The pattern of study in this instance shall be as follows:

Year 1 – PH4001 Looking and Making 1 + PH4002 Techniques: Photography
Year 2 – PH4000 Project Work 1 + CP4022 Critical and Contextual Studies (Photography and Fashion Photography) 1
Year 3 – CP5022 Critical and Contextual Studies (Photography and Fashion Photography) 2 + PH5001 Looking and Making 2
Year 4 – PH5000 Project Work 2 + PH5002 Professional Practice 1: Photography
Year 5 – CP6022 Critical and Contextual Studies: Dissertation (Photography and Fashion Photography) + PH6002 Looking and Making 3
Year 6 – PH6000 Major Project + PH6003 Professional Practice 2: Fashion Photography

Part-time Structure

Year 1 – PH4001 Looking and Making 1 + PH4002 Techniques: Photography
Year 2 – PH4000 Project Work 1 + CP4022 Critical and Contextual Studies (Photography and Fashion Photography) 1
Year 3 – CP5022 Critical and Contextual Studies (Photography and Fashion Photography) 2 + PH5001 Looking and Making 2
Year 4 – PH5000 Project Work 2 + PH5002 Professional Practice 1: Photography
Year 5 – CP6022 Critical and Contextual Studies: Dissertation (Photography and Fashion Photography) + PH6002 Looking and Making 3
Year 6 – PH6000 Major Project + PH6003 Professional Practice 2 :Fashion Photography

All modules on the course are core and compulsory (there is no flexibility in choice or in the order in which modules may be taken), interim awards are therefore defined by the course structure. The part time route is prescribed (section 23).

LEVEL 4 CORE MODULES:
PH4001 Looking and Making 1
PH4002 Techniques: Photography
PH4000 Project Work 1
CP4022 Critical and Contextual Studies (Photography and Fashion Photography) 1

LEVEL 5 CORE MODULES:
PH5001 Looking and Making 2
PH5002 Professional Practice 1: Photography
PH5000 Project Work 2
CP5022 Critical and Contextual Studies (Photography and Fashion Photography) 2

LEVEL 6 CORE MODULES:
PH6001 Looking and Making 3
PH6003 Professional Practice 2: Fashion Photography
PH6000 Major Project
CP6022 Critical and Contextual Studies: Dissertation (Photography and Fashion Photography)

The course’s principle of guiding learning through a practice-led curriculum promotes ongoing reflection and personal development. This is supported by regular formative feedback on work in progress that enables students to understand their development and find opportunities for multiple and individualised routes to successful outcomes. Most modules are year-long with first semester summative assessment. Mid semester points of review, ensure that students, together with their tutors, can devise study strategies appropriate to individual learning styles, while ensuring monitoring of engagement and progress. This system is highly individualised, but also benefits from peer engagement in group critiques.

Students are required to employ strong reflective skills across multiple modules. Within the Project modules at all levels students reflect on their own making, identifying ways in which their work can be iteratively developed.

At level 5 and level 6 students complete specific reflective journals in which they are required to demonstrate an understanding of the use of reflection to connect learning experience to the improvement of future performance.

The course’s engagement with external partners and employers ensures that personal development for career planning is effectively contextualised and suitable for the contemporary workplace.
Students increasingly take ownership of career planning as they progress though Level 5 and Level 6. At Level 6 students reflect on the skills that they have developed through the course. They research and outline possible career routes and are required to identify the subject specific and transferable skills required for roles to which they aspire and to formulate a plan of action in order to be able to pursue their career aims on graduation, which includes the development of an individual business and marketing plan that suits their aspirations.

Furthermore, students are invited to engage with the University’s Careers Office, which offers a programme of employability events and embedded work-related learning that supports students’ personal development planning. Through these initiatives, students are increasingly able, as they progress from year to year, to understand the professional environment of their disciplines, the various opportunities available to them, and how to shape their learning according to their ambitions.

The course recognises the importance of equipping students for future employability within the creative industries and beyond. You will develop an excellent understanding of how to make the most of your creative identity within diverse professional contexts. Students will build a wide array of professional and transferable skills needed for a career as a professional photographer whether within the fields of fashion, advertising and editorial photography or within fine art and documentary practices. Equally you will develop the essential knowledge and understanding that will enable you to begin a career in associated professions, ranging from being a fashion stylist, art director, retoucher, picture editor, photographic producer as well as photographers’ or models’ agent but also community practitioner, educator or academic. This is supported by tutors and visiting professionals who are all practising photographers with relevant experience in the field. Across the team you will be able to draw on their many years’ experience working within the editorial, fashion, advertising, fine art, documentary and academic fields.

Both early career and established visiting creative professionals will give you insights and knowledge that will enable you to plan and pursue your career on graduation. Simulated and live briefs teach you how to manage a creative commission and help you build knowledge and understanding that can be applied equally as a practicing photographer or artist as they can working within creative production and commissioning. Students enjoy many opportunities to engage with real world clients from modelling agencies and designers, local businesses and brands, community groups to commercial commissions.

Students can also benefit from support and guidance from the Careers and Employability services and the University’s business incubator unit, ‘Accelerator’. Sessions run in conjunction with the Careers Service addressing the skills necessary to plan and pursue careers within the creative sector are delivered at L5 and L6 as part of the Professional Practice module.

Students typically take-up careers in photography or the creative and cultural industries or progress to further study at MA and PhD level.

At a time when the skills of flexible working are in demand, photography graduates are well-positioned to succeed in the contemporary world of work.

Graduates of the Fashion Photography BA degree have a high rate of employability, and success stories include roles in picture editing, post-production, fashion and editorial photography, galleries, magazines, modelling agencies, picture libraries and in technical and creative industries.

Careers open to graduates of this course include fashion and the visual arts as freelance or in-house photographers, magazine editors, art directors, media and advertising professionals as well as careers in further and higher education.

You could also progress to further study at MA and PhD level.

In addition to the University's standard entry requirements, you should have:

• a minimum of grades BBC in three A levels in art or design subjects (or a minimum of 112 UCAS points from an equivalent Level 3 qualification, eg BTEC Level 3 Extended Diploma/Diploma, Advanced Diploma, Progression Diploma or Access to HE Diploma with 60 credits)
• a portfolio interview
• English language GCSE at grade C/4 or above (or equivalent)

Applicants with relevant professional qualifications or extensive professional experience will also be considered on a case by case basis.

We encourage applications from international/EU students with equivalent qualifications. We also accept mature students with diverse backgrounds and experiences.

Suitable applicants living in the UK will be invited to a portfolio interview. Applicants living outside the UK will be required to submit a portfolio of work via email.

If you do not have traditional qualifications or cannot meet the entry requirements for this undergraduate degree, you may still be able to gain entry by completing our Film, Photography and Media (including foundation year) BA (Hons) degree.