How many here do photography or have done at university?

I'm applying to uni's this year, and have decided to study photography, doing a foundation first.

So far, The Arts Institute in Bournmouth looks promising, with a foundation in Photography and Media.
also Brighton does a good course and there's a 2 year foundation, but if you show a lot of promise then you can skip to the second or even final year of your BA.

But i was just wondering if anyone else has good ideas about where's good to look at? I looked at kingston, but the foundation is broad based which isn't good for me, as i'm not really an artist 

So yeah any info on foundations, or even just the main degrees.

Any ideas would be great, i'm sure this will help quite a few on here as a lot of people seem to be really into photography.


Cheers,

James

I'm doing Photography, Video, and Digital Imaging at the Uni of Sunderland.

It's really good course, and I would really consider it if you dont mind coming so far north. We could do with slightly better equipment but then what we have is more than good enough to get us through the course. Also, regardless of the title the course is more photography based than video, infact there is only 2 video modules to choose from I think and even then you dont ahve to do it. It's also the more artsy and creative side to photography, rather than commercial and media based. So may or may not be to your liking.

The only  thing I can really really fault with this course is theres no business management modules like a lot of other courses offer, you know so you know how and where to look for work in photography when you've graduated, as trying to find work is very daunting and hard work.

My Missus doesn't actually have much to say about the Fashion Photography course at LCF so far. Other than half the people on it don't know how to use a camera and her tutor was mocking the facilities.. It's making me seriously question reapplying, though obviously it's early days. The main bonus of course is the location, of which there simply isn't anywhere better for fashion related courses without travelling to NYC or Paris!

LR: Is there anywhere with these ratings online or somewhere? I struggled to find out anything about the courses reputation bar student feedback, which i don't fancy taking over something similar to Offsted etc! Working on the live briefs thing sounds amazing too!

first things first mate, you need to decided what area of photography you want to cover, because I've been told by a number of people thats theres more students graduating their degrees in britain than there is related jobs in the whole of europe making it hugely competetive so going for a general photography degree doesnt really make sense atm (or at least not to me) as you want to be as focussed on your chosen area as possible to get the job you want (obviously you can branch out into other areas and explore but you want to still get the relevant skills-buissness as well as techinical cos a lot of work is handed to freelance photogs)

I'm personally doing documentary n photojournalism at gloucestershire uni (just started this year.) look at how proffessional a uni looks, i applied to staffordshire until i saw their leaflet they sent me with course details, it was very cheap looking and the information was poor, whereas glos uni sent me a whole glossy booklet packed with info and kept in regular contact regarding any changes i made, so i cancelled the staffs uni (im sure its an ok uni just not the impression i got) choice and went for glos uni.

Not sure foundation courses are necessary, i didnt do one and have never done photography at school in college, so im completely self taught until about 5 weeks ago when i came to uni, unless the course requires it I personally wouldnt bother with a foundation course, it seems a bit of a waste of a year (i dont know i could be wrong.)

so basically:
1)decide what area you want to go into (photographically)
2)search that course on ucas and just trawl through the unis it shows
3)go through and check each of the course details and module titles
4)narrow it down to 5 or whatever the maximum is
5) go see those unis and talk to the tutors on an open day
6) get a decent portfolio together (makes sure its presented well and semi professionally and be prepared to talk a lot about your work)
7)apply


seems a lot of work but its a massive decision to make and you wont want to make the wrong choice and end up regretting it the whole time you are there, cos you will be there for a minimum of 3 years if you do a full degree (sorry to put more pressure on you to get it right lol)

hope this helps

Cheers for these replys guys they do help, i ordered the University of Wales prospectus, it looks good.
I'm off to the arts institute on tuesday as well so hopefully that'll be good as it's the one i want to go to at the moment.
ANd yeah 'mind the gap' cheers for that, i know i can't be to vague as it is very competitive. IT's a commercial photography degree i'm looking at tomorow... i guess ideally i'd like to get into fashion photography? I'm still not sure yet though.

To put that into perspective slightly, our lecturer showed us a pricing list for a shoot done by his agency. I nearly wet myself! The photographer earned himself best part of £150,000 for 8 days work! He only charged £45,000 (Only! HA) for his time and effort, he got the money from royalities.

For example, if the client wanted to use the image for purely bus shelters in London for a year, you would charge say £25,000 in usage costs. Although, if they wanted to use it nationwide, for bus shelters and billboards for a year, you could charge upwards of £100,000 for the pleasure. All of which comes in a cheque to you as the photographer!

f**k yeah! Me too!

At the risk of souding immensely immature....







TITS!