BA (Hons) Film and Television Production

Why choose this course?

• Industry partnerships with Warner Bros. and the Production Guild
• Receive guest lectures from leading industry names
• Exclusive partnership with Halo Post-Production and the ENVY Academy

The Film and Television programme is a ScreenSkills and CILECT accredited course that provides an environment in which students can grow into confident television and film practitioners. We are proud to be among the top 20 for film production, nationally (The Guardian), delivering industry ready graduates into the workplace.

Our course is designed to put the industry and its needs at the heart of our teaching.  Students learn professional skills from the outset, managing and producing their own location and studio-based shoots, and getting the opportunity to experience a variety of key roles on set and in post-production.

Our close partnerships with leading industry figures ensures that students hear about the latest commercial developments, while also putting into practice the long-established methods and techniques, workflows, and standards employed by film and television companies globally.

During your studies, you can take control of your own specialist career development, choosing to focus on those areas of production and post-production that best suit your passions and employment aims.

With modules covering the theory, history and contemporary practice of film and television, the course gives you an understanding of the industry’s past while preparing you to take an active part in its future.

Film and Television successes

Our students are winners of the prestigious Royal Television Society London Student Awards for Best Drama 2022 and Best Production Design Craft Award 2022.

Film and Television industry links

We are proud to be in partnership with the Edinburgh International Television Festival talent network scheme. The opportunity exists for final year students to apply for this highly acclaimed new talent programme. This can help fast track you to employment via mentorship and internships from leading companies and broadcasters such as BBC, Endemol, ITV and Sky.

In post-production, we are members of ENVY Academy which provides graduates with the chance to work with ENVY Post-Production in London. Several graduates have gone on to start the careers at ENVY working on productions including The Chase and Gogglebox.

Our red carpet event end of year show for final year students – Visions Festival – has sponsorship from a stellar list of industry partners:

• Avid – Best Post-Production Sound
• BFI – Best Dissertation
• Elstree Studios – Best Post-Production Editing
• The Kubrick Estate – Stanley Kubrick Prize for Fiction
• Warner Bros Studios Leavesden – Best Production Design
• The Lord Lew Grade Foundation – Lord Lew Grade Award for Individual Student Achievement
• Zeiss – Best Cinematography

This gives our students strong employability skills. Many prize winners go onto jobs with our industry partners.

Film and Television facilities

The course regularly invests in high quality production and post-production equipment, often making new purchases every year.

Our camera range includes Blackmagic URSA 4.6K digital cinema cameras, Canon C100, Canon XF305, and Panasonic 371; with lenses from Zeiss and Samyang. Our production equipment includes Kino Flo and Arri lamps; Sennheiser, SQN and Zoom microphones and recorders; and our professional grip equipment includes Steadicam rigs, Jibs, and Dollies. 

The Mike Newell Sound Stage TV Studio is a large dedicated HD broadcast standard facility complete with a railed light rig and pedestal cameras with autocue systems, green screen and vision mixer.

Our post-production facilities consist of the 50 seat Walter Murch Post-Production Lab and a second 30 seat dedicated lab with major post production software available from Avid Media Composer and Pro Tools for picture and sound editing, Baselight and DaVinci Resolve for colour correction, and Final Draft and MovieMagic Budgeting and Scheduling for scriptwriting and production planning.

A 96 terabyte shared storage facility by EditShare enables students to edit projects collaboratively and simultaneously, mirroring industry standard workflows and practice, while also giving students access to our library of over 23,000 sound effects and 4,000 music tracks to use in their edits.

Additional dedicated individual post production suites ideal for colour grading, and dubbing studios for ADR and audio finishing are available for students to book.

Visiting Tutors and Professors

Prof. Val Kuklowsky

Visiting Professor of Sound Post-Production

Val is an Emmy and BAFTA award nominee working as a post-production sound supervisor, with credits including Game of Thrones, Independence Day, A Knight’s Tale, U571 and Moonlighting,

Prof. Kate Kinninmont M.B.E

Visiting Professor on Gender in Media

Kate is the former Chief Executive of the Guild in Women in Film and Television. An experienced director and producer in television, Kate acts as a visiting professor, engaging our students with industry developments including the Time’s Up and #MeToo movements.

Jan Harlan

Honorary Doctorate holder, Executive Producer

Jan was Stanley Kubrick’s Executive Producer and worked with him on his last five films; followed by working with Spielberg on AI: Artificial Intelligence.  Jan’s teaching is known worldwide, and he has been teaching at Herts for eight years.

Mike Newell

Honorary Doctorate holder, Director

Mike is the director of Four Weddings and a Funeral, Donnie Brasco, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.  Mike gives guest masterclasses, and invited students to the post sound mix of his films.

Film and Television student testimonials

“Since leaving the course I have worked on Wonder Woman, The Mummy and Solo: A Star Wars Story as a Set Production Assistant. Most recently, I just finished work on Spider-Man Far From Home.

I have been offered a job on Overlord and will get to work with J.J Abrams as a result! 

I’m also working on my first short film outside of university and have the backing of Warner Brothers Creative Talent,  I will be getting to use Panavision for all of our camera equipment and maybe shoot on film.”

– Ellie Rawlings, Graduate 2016

Warner Brothers Creative Talent Scheme

Our final year students are eligible to apply to become a Warner Brothers Creative Talent scholar. We are proud to have been the first undergraduate course in the country to be selected for this partnership. Now in its fifth year, the scheme provides professional mentoring and a bursary fund of up to £10,000.  

Royal Television Society Bursary

We’re pleased to announce that the RTS Bursary is again available for undergraduates Successful applicants will receive £1,000 each year for three years plus student membership of the RTS and the Hospital Club in London’s Covent Garden – a private club popular with media professionals. Full details of the scheme are at RTS Bursary.

What will I study?

The course is taught as a range of lectures, workshops, seminars and tutorials. Practical workshops run each week in location kit and post-production, and dedicated TV studio sessions; while theory modules have screening programmes; and students organise and schedule their own film shoots off campus during filming weeks.

There are field trips to Broadcast Studios such as the BBC and Elstree Studios to attend live TV recordings such as A League of Their Own, Celebrity Juice and other entertainment shows. RTS and BFI lectures are also offered to students, and we have annual trips to the Cannes Film Festival, Sheffield Doc/Fest and Edinburgh International Television Festival.