Course Essentials
Welcome to Canterbury Christ Church University, congratulations on starting your Film Production degree! We are delighted that you have chosen to study Film Production with us. Over the next three years, you will be learning a wide variety of film production techniques as well as developing your understanding of cinematic theory. Tutors will be on hand to answer any questions you may have during the introductory sessions in Welcome Week. Congratulations again and we hope you enjoy your time here.
The Course Team
Academic Calendar: Semesters
View key dates for this Academic Calendar for 2025-26 including when teaching starts and finishes and when you break for holidays.
Your Welcome Week is an essential introduction to your course and the wider University, helping you to feel confident and prepared for your studies right from the very start.
It is important to check your Course Welcome Week for all the activities you are required to attend as part of your course induction. If any of your welcome activities are in groups, your course team will contact you before you arrive to let you know which group you will be in.
In addition, check the Student Events Hub for a range of fun activities. including the Students’ Union Welcome Fair, to help you make friends and live your best CCCU student life.
Your teaching timetable
UniTimetables provides an overview of all teaching activities for a course. If your course is taught in groups, it will display information for all groups, not just the group you will be assigned to.
Your individual student timetable will show you what modules and groups you are expected to attend via MyTimetable. This will be available for when your teaching starts.
Learn more about timetabling for new students including user guides and videos.
Welcome to Film Production; the whole team look forward to meeting you!
You will be required to be creative, well-organised, reliable, enthusiastic, and will work both independently and in teams. We will inspire you to learn, create, question, and ultimately succeed in developing your creativity as well as a range of skills.
As part of your degree, you will be working with film production equipment from the very first week of teaching. Over the course of your first year, you will be introduced to a wide variety of different film production roles, including cinematography, directing, sound design, editing, and producing. It might be interesting for you, at this stage, to familiarise yourself with the various and wide-ranging roles found in the Film Production industry.
This course is predominantly taught in face-to-face classes; these sessions will be where you will learn how to use specialist film equipment. Face-to-face classes will be enhanced with the online resources available on your module virtual learning environment (Blackboard) pages.
The staff and students on the degree are part of a wider community of creative practitioners in Canterbury Christ Church University, this includes performers, composers, producers, game designers, photographers, and dancers. We hope that you’ll take advantage of the opportunity to gain inspiration from this diverse community and expand and enhance your own creative practice.
Follow us on Instagram: @cccu_film
To get ready for September, do watch as many different films and other media as you can, whether in the cinema, on television, or on streaming sites. Start to consider different genres, to watch and challenge yourself to watch films you wouldn't usually choose. When watching, you should also be thinking about making films, and can even start right now, whether on your own phone, DSLR (stills camera) or video equipment. If you don’t know Canterbury, do familiarise yourself with the city and check out the local cinemas, including the Curzon (we now have two) and the Gulbenkian. Make sure you get a student discount card and keep an eye out for information about the Film Society and Film Club (run by staff and students from the Film Production course). A good place to look at film reviews is the Guardian's website; these come out on a Friday. Mark Kermode also does film reviews on his podcast show (with reviews also uploaded to YouTube) and there are many independent film critiques on other sites; focus on those that offer evidence from the film to support their ideas. Some film websites and publications do have subscriptions - it's a good chance to look for student discounts. It's also important to think about short films; this is the format that you will make with us and also one of the most common ways to get started in the industry. Please also look at websites such as Screenskills, BAFTA and Kent Film Office as they are a great way of finding out what's going on locally and nationally, you could also start to follow key film figures on social media. During the semester we recommend that you check your university email every day as this is the main place where tutors will contact you. Your email inbox is also where you will be sent news about exciting opportunities as well as information about events that are happening around the campus. During your employability modules you will be hearing from leading industry figures; don't forget to check them out ahead of the session and start to build up your network with your peers and guest speakers through sites like LinkedIn.
Your ‘Welcome and Induction’ will be w/c 15 September 2025 - we look forward to meeting you then.
The text recommendations below are an excellent introduction to Film and can be used for many of the modules, but please note that there is no requirement to purchase every book you require for your studies as the University library has a very good selection of course books which gets updated every year.
It is useful to note that the University Bookshop offers 10% discount on most titles in print and have some price-beating book bundles. They also price match Amazon on core texts recommended in the module handbooks you will receive when you start in September. Your tutors will give you more information about specific texts when you start your taught sessions.
International students: don't miss out! Make sure you register for our international student success programme which provides practical advice on preparing to live and study in the UK.
Have a question?