MA Filmmaking (Screen Documentary)

This MA will develop your skills and creative vision in documentary production. It enhances your understanding of the historical context and contemporary modes of documentary production against a backdrop of the wider issues in media production.

• This Masters, a pathway of the MA Filmmaking, will encourage your understanding of the politics, aesthetics and ethics of documentary production, and the nature and diversity of documentary practice in contemporary society.
• The programme is housed in a new purpose-built media facility equipped with state-of-the-art teaching spaces including a range of digital cameras, Avid Media Composer, and Adobe Premiere Film Editing suites, Digital Special Effects, Pro Tools Audio Postproduction suites.
• You will be able to make your own documentaries, learning and refining research, interviewing, self-shooting and editing techniques. The programme encourages you to develop your own distinctive authorial voice and gain a range of skills that will make you highly employable.
• You work on at least two films during the year, culminating in a major production towards the end of the degree. In addition you can attend classes in related disciplines such as Cinematography and Editing. This framework is designed to provide you with a breadth of filmmaking knowledge combined with a high level of expertise in your chosen filmmaking discipline.
• The MA encourages you to develop:
  • an awareness of documentary production techniques, ethics and aesthetics
  • specific filmmaking and production management skills
  • technical skills (including camera, lighting and sound editing)
  • an understanding of the workings of the media and their broad cultural and social impacts
• The Department of Media, Communications and Cultural Studies has been ranked second in the UK for 'world-leading or internationally excellent' research (Research Excellence Framework, 2021) and 16th in the world (third in the UK) in the 2024 QS World Rankings for communication and media studies.

Contact the department

If you have specific questions about the degree, contact Daisy Asquith.

You should have (or expect to be awarded) an undergraduate degree of at least upper second class standard in a relevant/related subject as well as a level of practical experience from work in the arts or the media.

You might also be considered for the programme if you aren’t a graduate or your degree is in an unrelated field, but have relevant experience and can show that you have the ability to work at postgraduate level.

Because funding deadlines and requirements vary around the world, applications are considered on a rolling basis from February onwards and places on the programme fill up across the recruitment cycle. For this reason, we strongly advise you to submit your completed application as early as you can.

International qualifications

We accept a wide range of international qualifications. Find out more about the qualifications we accept from around the world.

If English isn’t your first language, you will need an IELTS score (or equivalent English language qualification) of 7.0 with a 7.0 in writing and no element lower than 6.5 to study this programme.

Where the MA Fimmaking can take you

If you are passionate about fashioning an exciting career for yourself as a filmmaker in an environment that promotes innovative filmmaking, this course is for you.

Our alumni are active in the film, media and cultural industries around the world, working and winning awards as documentary producers and directors.

Recent alumni are active in the film, media and cultural industries around the world as:

• Cinematographers
• Film camera operators
• Television camera operators
• Lighting designers
• Focus pullers
• Gaffers
• Grips
• Steadicam operators

Find out more about employability at Goldsmiths.

Award-winning alumni

Our former students have gone on to win awards including:

• BAFTA for Best Student Documentary
• Grierson nominations for Best Student Documentary
• Best Documentary at the Exposures Film Festival
• Postgraduate Factual Prize at the Royal Television Society Student Awards
• Student Award at the One World Media Awards
• RTS Award for Best Editing

They've also launched their own film festivals, worked on critically acclaimed films and documentaries, and have had their work screened at the London International Documentary Festival, National Geographic's All Roads Film Festival and Open City, the London Documentary Festival.

Find out more about employability at Goldsmiths.