School
Digital and Screen Media
UCAS tariff points
112-144
Years of Entry
2024 2025
Location
Main Campus (Horsforth)
Study abroad
Yes
Study Mode
Full time (3 years)

Course overview

Do you want to turn your passion for photography into your career? Our Photography degree will develop your visual, analytical, technical and creative abilities through photographic practice.

You will investigate, research and engage with a range of photographic areas to gain knowledge, understanding and skills within the field of photography.

The degree offers opportunities to work across analogue, digital and hybrid photographic practices, both in the studio and on location. You will investigate through visual and theoretical research and develop an understanding of critical engagement within photography.

The Student Contract

About this course

The emphasis of our Photography degree is based around your creative development and ability to work both independently and as part of a team.

You will study the key legal and ethical aspects of photography, applying these to your professional and photographic practice.

We have fully equipped on-campus studios and darkroom facilities and offer all students free-of-charge loan of professional photography equipment and resources as well as access to our Mac computer suite, so you’ll have all you need to continue to develop your photography skills and experience.

During your degree, you will work towards a final year portfolio and exhibition. You will also complete professional work placements which form an integral part of your curriculum.

In your final year, you can extend your professional understanding of the discipline and build your portfolio through an additional longer term placement in the creative industries.

Through professional practices and guidance workshops and collaborations with organisations such as the National Media and Science Museum, you’ll learn how to seek out suitable career opportunities. You’ll also undertake photographic projects in the community, enabling you to develop your communication skills and 
build knowledge, contacts and networks for your future career. 

Why study with us?

  • You will develop a wide range of creative, analytical, visual and technical skills.
  • You will be taught by experts from the field of photography and will have the opportunity to complete creative industry work placements as part of your degree.
  • You will have access to a wide range of digital and analogue photography equipment from our Media Centre.
  • We will give you guidance and support to produce, exhibit, print and promote your own work.

Specialist facilities

You’ll have access to industry-standard spaces and equipment including production rooms, Mac and PC editing suites and TV, radio and photography studios. These specialist facilities will enable you to develop your practical and technical skills, produce a portfolio of professional work across different media platforms and prepare you for your graduate career in the industry.

Explore our facilities

Course Modules

You will study a variety of modules across your programme of study. The module details given below are subject to change and are the latest example of the curriculum available on this course of study.

Year 1

During your first year, you'll study four core modules.

Professional Development (Core)

You'll develop teamworking skills through creative challenges, taught sessions, profiling and self-understanding.

You'll work on team presentation and develop a professional persona through attitude, commitment and effective communication.

In the second semester, you'll look at enterprise and sector analysis.

You'll develop your solo presentation and pitching skills.

We'll cover the creativity and skills needed to start, maintain and grow your production streams as independent creators.

We'll help you develop the skills valued by the creative industries to help you become a professional with an industry-relevant work ethic.

Studio Practice (Core)

You'll learn a range of photographic studio practices and develop an understanding of the process of photographic production.

You'll learn techniques such as studio lighting, get familiar with the equipment and produce work through print and online processes.

You'll explore how ideas are realised through a process of research, experimentation and development of works.

Aesthetics of the Image (Core)

Develop a stylistic, aesthetic and intellectual orientation for your future work.

You'll study published works and photographers to analyse, apply and interpret the content discussed in class.

You'll analyse and interpret photographs from historical, stylistic and aesthetic viewpoints.

We'll look at historical movements, trends and styles from different perspectives including representations of reality, photographic composition, visual culture and narrative structure.

We'll also cover the technical, aesthetic and cultural shift from analogue to digital.

Photographic Practice 1 (Core)

Get an introduction to contemporary photographic processes and practice.

You'll work across digital, analogue and hybrid photographic media, equipment and outputs.

Develop your production skills by bringing together your research and photographic practice.

You'll work with industry-standard software and professional photographic equipment.

Demonstrate and evidence your developing understanding of contemporary photographic practice through integrated practice, analysis and reflection.

Year 2

During your second year, you'll study five core modules.

Professional Placement (Core)

Develop your professional skills to help with your CV, interviews, networking, self-marketing, and industry-specific employability skills.

You'll have talks from external speakers and industry contacts as well as internal expertise, preparing you for your first external placement.

Develop your skills in creative problem-solving, idea generation, project management and enterprise through creative productions.

This will also develop freelancing skills and equip you to be flexible and professional in the creative industry, whether self-employed or as an employee or employer.

Contextualising Practice (Core)

Get familiar with visual research approaches in photography and develop as an independent and original critical thinker.

You'll learn how to identify suitable topics for your research-led practice project and place them in the context of existing fields of knowledge and practice so you can frame pertinent research questions.

You'll engage with ethical issues in research and learn how to choose the most appropriate visual methods.

You'll learn how to design and plan a project and produce a proposal forming the basis of your Level 6 research portfolio.

Photographic Practice 2 (Core)

Advance your skills and knowledge of photographic practices, terminology, methodologies and techniques.

You'll work across digital, analogue and hybrid photographic processes and outputs to create a portfolio.

We'll explore the ways photography and photographic history interrelate and interact.

You'll see how significant photographers are linked to cultural influences, industry developments, art movements, technological advances and innovation.

You'll work with photographic equipment and be encouraged to select and combine photojournalism, landscape, photo essay, still life, fine art and portraiture.

Collaborative Photography (Core)

Get an understanding of the power balance between the photographer and their subject.

You'll study the historical and ethical contexts of the role of photography and community and learn about the socially engaged photographic movement and its practitioners.

You'll produce a project meaningful to audiences and participants, embedded within a critically engaged and ethical framework.

This'll help you understand the importance of collaboration, communication and planning.

Curating Photographs (Core)

Learn how to curate a photography exhibition.

You'll explore artist exhibitions past and present, learn how to experiment with materials (sequencing and sizing) and work within a set space.

In a team, you'll find out how to fundraise and organise the opening evening of an exhibition, communicating with printers, framers and venues.

You'll market and promote the show preview within the University, local community and online.

Year 3

During your final year, you'll study four core modules.

Professional Project (Core)

You'll take on a work-based project or intervention, or an alternative professional development project.

You'll negotiate a project with your employer or placement provider that meets their needs as well as the university.

You'll have a series of seminars to outline the challenge, followed by tutorial support to chart progress and help you towards your assessment.

As a negotiated, self-managed module, you'll receive initial support to establish the learning outcomes and appropriate assessment methods.

You'll engage in online support and arrange tutorials with your academic supervisor.

Research Project (Core)

You'll produce a piece of critical writing or media artefact, taking the form of a dissertation, research by practice or creative project.

You'll conduct detailed research with appropriate levels of supervision.

The topic will reflect your interests, enabling you to explore an aspect of study in more depth and build on your studies across the levels.

Exhibition (Core)

You'll work on the final stages of your research portfolio projects, including technical, conceptual and practical competence and coherence.

You'll work towards the curation and installation of a final exhibition of your portfolio.

Working in teams, you'll organise the various elements required to curate, install and promote a degree-standard exhibition, with support from tutors.

You'll plan and collaborate with others and draw on your communication and curation skills from previous modules.

You'll carry out research by going to galleries, contacting professionals such as artists, and taking part in peer group discussions and tutorials.

Contemporary Photography (Core)

We'll look at artists, materials, themes and interdisciplinary ideas to discuss the key debates and practices of contemporary photography.

You'll explore photobook making and AI photography to find new ways of thinking about the medium, and ask what the future of photography could look like.

You'll create a brief and action plan, then develop a body of creative work that shows who you are as a photographic practitioner.

Professional work placements

Experience matters. That's why we embed professional work placements within our standard undergraduate degrees.

How does it work?

Careers and Placements will work with you to find your perfect placement or help you arrange your own, whether that's in Leeds, another part of the UK or even abroad. You will be able to take part in a series of workshops, events and live ‘employer challenges’ to boost your confidence and prepare you for your placement.

During your placement, you will have an opportunity to gain degree-relevant work experience, build your knowledge of career sectors and secure valuable employer references and industry contacts. This experience will help you to shape your career decisions and find the right path for you.

We will work with you to find placements that match your career aspirations, using our extensive links with organisations in the creative industries and photographic sector. Placement opportunities include working with industry photographers, studios, gallery assistants/curators, and marketing and design companies to help you discover the skills required to work in the photography industry and the professional sector.

To find out how we can help you make your career ambitions a reality, visit:

Professional Work Placements

Learning and Teaching

At Leeds Trinity we aim to provide an excellent student experience and provide you with the tools and support to help you achieve your academic, personal and professional potential.

Our Learning, Teaching and Assessment Strategy delivers excellence by providing the framework for:

  • high quality teaching
  • an engaging and inclusive approach to learning, assessment and achievement
  • a clear structure through which you progress in your academic studies, your personal development and towards professional-level employment or further study.

We have a strong reputation for developing student employability, supporting your development towards graduate employment, with relevant skills embedded throughout your programme of study.

We endeavour to develop curiosity, confidence, courage, ambition and aspiration in all students through the key themes in our Learning and Teaching Strategy:

  • Student Involvement and Engagement
  • Inclusion
  • Integrated Programme and Assessment Experience
  • Digital Literacy and Skills
  • Employability and Enterprise

To help you achieve your potential we emphasise learning as a collaborative process, with a range of student-led and real-world activities. This approach ensures that you fully engage in shaping your own learning, developing your critical thinking and reflective skills so that you can identify your own strengths and weaknesses, and use the extensive learning support system we offer to shape your own development.

We believe the secret to great learning and teaching is simple: it is about creating an inclusive learning experience that allows all students to thrive through:

  • Personalised support
  • Expert lecturers
  • Strong connections with employers
  • An international outlook
  • Understanding how to use tools and technology to support learning and development

Programme delivery

Your time on campus, learning through in-person teaching, is at the heart of your academic experience and the way we deliver our programmes. This is supported and further enhanced by additional engagement activities and opportunities provided online and through digital teaching materials. This blended approach seeks to ensure a positive learning and teaching student experience.

Your programme of study has been carefully designed around a three-phase model of delivery:

  1. Preparation: You will be given clear tasks to support you in preparing for live teaching. This could include watching a short-pre-recorded lecture, reading a paper or text chapter or preparing other material for use in class.
  2.  Live: All your live teaching will be designed around active learning, providing you with valuable opportunities to build on preparation tasks, interact with staff and peers, and surface any misunderstandings.
  3. Post: Follow-up activities will include opportunities for you to check understanding, for staff to receive feedback from you and your peers to inform subsequent sessions, and for you to apply learning to new situations or context.

Preparation, Live and Post teaching and learning and the digital materials used will vary by course, but will be designed to help you structure your learning, take a full and active part in your course, and apply and test your developing knowledge and skills.

Assessment

A variety of assessment methods are used, matched to the learning outcomes for your programme, allowing you to apply and demonstrate the full range of knowledge and skills that you have developed.

For more details on specific assessment methods for this course contact hello@leedstrinity.ac.uk

Entry Requirements

Leeds Trinity University is committed to recruiting students with talent and potential and who we feel will benefit greatly from their academic and non-academic experiences here. We treat every application on its own merits; we value highly the experience you illustrate in your personal statement.

Information about the large range of qualifications we accept, including A-Levels, BTECs and T Levels, can be found on our entry requirements page. If you need additional advice or are taking qualifications that are not covered in the information supplied, please contact our Admissions Office.

Entry requirements for this course:
QualificationGrade
UCAS tariff112-144
GCSE requirementsGCSE English Language or English Literature at grade C or above is required

Fees and finance

Funding

UK Home Students:

Tuition fees cost £9,250 a year for this course in 2024/2025.

Part-time tuition fees will be prorated accordingly to the number of credits you're studying.

Depending on government policy, tuition fees may change in future years.

Tuition fees for 2025/26 entry will be set in summer 2024.

Living costs, e.g. accommodation, travel, food, will also need to be taken into consideration.

Leeds Trinity offers a range of bursaries and scholarships to help support students while you study.

International Students, including EU Students:

Visit our webpage for international students.

Part-time study is not available for international students on a Student Route Visa. 

Additional costs

We advise students that there may be additional course costs in addition to annual tuition fees:

  • Recommended and required reading lists will be provided at the start of your course. All the books and e-books are available from our Library to borrow but you may choose to purchase your own.
  • On some courses there may be additional costs, such as field trips, equipment, accreditations, that may be part-funded by the University. More details will be provided at the start of the course.
  • You'll need to include placement/s travel and associated costs too, however the University will contribute a standard amount towards your total expenditure.
  • The University provides students with a £6 printing credit each academic year which can be topped up either on campus or online.

How to apply

For full-time undergraduate courses, you apply through UCAS. That's the University and Colleges Admissions Service.

On your application form, you'll need to know our institution code - it's L24 - and the course code. If you click through to the UCAS website using the button below, it'll take you to the right place with all the information you need.

You'll need to write a personal statement - we've prepared a guide to help you.

Although the equal consideration deadline has passed for 2024 entry there are still ways to apply now.

If you included five choices on your application, have received decisions from all five, and weren’t accepted, or if you declined the offers you received, you will be able to use Extra which opens on 28 February. If you use Extra to add another choice you cannot reverse this to go back to your original five choices.

If you did not use all your choices in your initial application, you don't need to use Extra, you can just sign in to your application and add another choice, as long as it’s before 30 June, and you’ve not accepted or declined any offers.

If you don’t hold any offers after 5 July, you will be able to add an additional choice using Clearing.

If you require a Student Route Visa in order to study in the UK, then you must meet all the conditions of your offer and present all supporting documentation required for the visa application no later than Friday 26 July 2024.

Applications are not yet open for courses starting in September 2025. You can register and start your application for 2025 from 14 May 2024, although you cannot submit it until later in the year. The UCAS application deadline for courses starting in September 2025 is 29 January 2025.

There's lots more information about the application process on the UCAS website, or you can get in touch with our admissions team who will be happy to help:

Graduate opportunities

Providing you with the opportunity to develop the professional skills and experience you need to launch your career is at the heart of everything we do at Leeds Trinity University.

You’ll be well-prepared for a career in professional photography, photojournalism, the gallery and museum heritage sector, PR and event management, as well as a range of other professional careers.

After you graduate, Careers and Placements will help you as you pursue your chosen career through our mentoring scheme, support with CV and interview preparation and access to graduate employability events.

To find out how we can help you make your career ambitions a reality, visit:

Careers

Chat with our students

Do you want to find out more about studying at Leeds Trinity University?

Ask our Student Ambassadors about what it’s like to be part of the Leeds Trinity University community, chat to them about your course(s) of interest and hear more about their Leeds Trinity University student experience.

Chat with our students

What is Discover Uni?

Discover Uni is the official, authoritative source of information and guidance on higher education in the UK. The website allows you to search for and compare data and information on university and college programmes from across the UK.

It helps you make sense of all the information out there by linking to other quality resources and explaining what can be found where. It also allows you to search for and compare information and data for individual undergraduate courses across the UK.

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