Model Making & Visual FX

The BA (Hons) Model Making & Visual FX degree here at The Northern School of Art has been developed directly with our industry partners, who include visual effects artists, miniature effects designers and model makers. Our programme teaches students to combine creativity with high levels of technical ability, developing practical workshop techniques with digital skills to help students secure employment in the screen Industries and beyond. As an industry focused course, we have worked with a range of organisations and professional freelancers including: Aardman Animation, Industrial Light & Magic, Alpha Star Productions, Sea and Sky Pictures and Proto Digital Production Facility and more!

The practical skills you will learn on this course are relevant to a wide range of careers, including film and television prop making, puppet and character development for stop frame animation, animatronics and automata for exhibition, concept models for the games industry, model making and design for theatre, architectural model making, prototyping for industrial designers, interactive exhibition models and photographic props for advertising.

You will learn not only traditional technical skills, such as sculpting, mould making and model making but also digital skills, including digital scanning and 3D printing with industry-standard software and equipment.

Working alongside complementary programmes in the stage and screen faculty you will work on a number of collaborative projects. Enhancing productions through your creativity e.g making a miniature-model establishing shot, digital set extension or augmenting a practical prop with some visual flourishes. By the end of the three-year course, you will have produced a showreel and portfolio of models composited into VFX sequences and settings.