Year one core modules

• 3D Technology and Art Fundamentals

  This module introduces the core skills and processes used in Computer Games and Visual Effects: the creative fusion of digital technology and art. You will develop an understanding of the balance between the technical requirements of computer graphics and art production. Technical control needs to be matched with creativity, and so in this module you will be presented with the technical basics of 3D image creation, manipulation and how forms need to work with colour theory, perspective and design principles. The module will develop your awareness and working knowledge of how images are constructed and read by setting a series of production tasks throughout this module. Using 3D software you will be asked answer a range of project briefs for example build 3D environments, animations and game assets. With each brief you will encounter exercises and seminars relating to the technologies and formats you are using. For instance, as you build models you will learn about 3D modelling in the light of other artists' interpretations of space, drawing and use of colour. As you bring your 3D objects to life, we also examine trompe l'oeil and means of representing movement in painting and sculpture.

• Digital Compositing

  It has a lineage originating from the early days of film. At this stage of the pathway we introduce what could be described as Vertical Editing - the layering and manipulation of images to create a unified final seamless image. This module considers techniques that will allow you to select and layer parts of disparate images in order to create new scenes, new spaces. A compositor will take 3D images, text, bitmap and vector files and in many cases use his or her skill to give a uniform look so that it might be imagined that all these disparate elements have always existed together. If you've seen a Hollywood Blockbuster movie you have seen the compositor at work, but more often than not, the compositors work is invisible - wire removal, colour correction, keying, de-graining are the sort of skills you will not see if he or she has been successful. In this module we look at basic compositing and as you create new composites you will be asked to use creative judgement on whether these new images are believable and what aesthetic conventions are supporting them.

• Illustration in the Round

  This module looks at how the illusion of a 3D environment can be created through sequential movement on a flat screen. In this module you will, through practice, gain insights into the various practices in animation from traditional hand drawn cell animation, rotoscoping, stop frame animation, through to the practice and concepts which drive 3D animation. You will learn about parallax, illusions of camera-eye movement, keyframing, cell animation, layouts, storyboarding, overlays and loops. This module then examines the possibilities of building an imaginative 3D environment in an illustrative sense, engaging with tools that allow the illustrator the new freedom of working sequentially and in the round with digital technologies. This module gives you grounding in the historical antecedents. It will also include references to illustrators and artists who have immersed aspects of their practice into 2D, virtual and sculptural 3D space. You explore this practice through an experimental 'mark-making' environment, establishing illustration-focused ways of image creation. You will be encouraged to experiment and incorporate aspects of design and fine art into your practical work within this module.

Year two core modules

• Character Rigging & Animation
• Code, Light and Surface: Advanced 3D
• Digital Practice

Year three core modules

• Major Project
• Research Project
• Showreel Preparation

Year one optional modules

• Anglia Language Programme Module
• Graphic Design: Contextual Studies
• Computer & Video Games Studies

Year two optional modules

• Anglia Language Programme Module
• Graphic Design: Contextual Studies
• Debates & Practices: Computer Games & Visual Effects
• Writing for Images