School of Creative Industries – Art & Design

School of Creative Industries – Art & Design

You will be charged a studio fee of £40 at the beginning of your AS and A2 years. Payment is compulsory but you must talk to me, your tutor or the guidance centre if you think you will have a problem paying. The money goes towards equipment and resources that you will be able to use throughout the year such as developing chemicals, studio backgrounds, paper, paint and batteries.

We will provide you with some basic art materials from the studio fee, but in order to get the most out of your AS Photography course you will require some basic equipment of your own. You will not be able to complete the required work without your own basic art stuff. Cheap places to buy gear... The college shop, BJ’s, Banana bookshop (Atlantic Village), and don’t forget that Blue Gallery give a student discount.

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  A USB Flash Drive or portable hard drive – AT LEAST 8Gigs in capacity but the bigger the better. The best place to look is online;
  
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  An SD card of at least 2 Gigs in capacity;
  

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  A range of soft drawing pencils (B, 2B, 4B, 6B);
  
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  Some watercolour pencils, or pencil crayons;
  
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  Various colour Biro, fine liner or gel pens (NOT YELLOW);
  
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  Pritt stick;
  

During the year you will also need to buy a number of A3 spiral bound sketchbooks – ‘Pink Pig’ Portrait bound ones are best - at least one for each of the two units of work. You can get them at the college shop or online. An A3 Plastic portfolio is also a good idea to protect your work as you transport it between home & college on a regular basis.

I would strongly recommend that you buy the following books:

You will need to pay a little towards printing costs in the photography room, you will be shown how to put money on your account at the start of the year. You may need to pay to get your final work printed too, for digital work I have been recommending students use Photobox.co.uk as they seem cheap, fast, and of a good quality. I’ll tell you more when the time comes.

The college has a new darkroom facility which you will be able to have full use of once you know how. While the college and your studio fee will cover most of the costs of this, you might have to buy film and photo paper from time to time if you use it a lot or want to try bigger or more experimental things.

The department has some camera equipment that it is possible to borrow or use in the photostudio, but some students choose to invest in a good camera of their own, whether digital or not. If you think you might want to buy any equipment it is probably best to wait until you can discuss all the possibilities with me once you have settled into the course.