Film Directing MA and MFA

The department of Film & TV at Edinburgh College of Art has a fantastic track record of student awards and still progresses from strength to strength. In 2005 the industry’s skills council Skillset endorsed Edinburgh College of Art, in collaboration with Napier University, as a ‘Centre of Excellence’ in film education and training and a member of the UK-wide network of Screen Academies. Visit the Screen Academy Scotland website for further information.

The Scottish Documentary Institute is a research centre based at the College specialising in the production and distribution of documentaries in cinema. It aims to create a synergy between the practice and study of documentary film, to link industry and academia - in Scotland, the UK and internationally.

Students are given the opportunity to work across fiction, documentary and experimental media. Students join an international body of postgraduate students coming from different cultural traditions to work in a broad range of audio-visual media within an integrated framework.

The aim of the Film Directing programme is to:

• Produce professionally able students skilled in two production disciplines across a range of programme types
• Combine the contemporary energy and discipline of fine art practices with the professionalism and accountability of contemporary media industry practices, in order to produce innovative and grounded work.
• Facilitate the inter-relationship between different cultural traditions, traditional and emerging screen technologies, and classical and non-traditional cinematic genres and conventions. 
• Provide postgraduate education in media production that constitutes a clear progression from undergraduate education whilst maintaining distinctiveness from industrial training.
• Challenge boundaries, encourage original thought, and develop intellectual and critical approaches to making meaning in sounds and images.

While a written dissertation forms part of the assessment process, these programmes are designed as a means of developing and extending creative practice. Students who wish to concentrate on theory will find the programmes offered by the Centre for Visual & Cultural Studies more appropriate; Contemporary Art Theory, Visual Culture and Visual & Material Culture.

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