In the latest New Course Discourse, we ask Course Leader Adrian Mott to talk us through a brand new postgraduate courses in the School of Media: Graduate Diploma in Photography.

So Adrian, what’s the difference between the Graduate Diploma in Photography course and the PG Dip Portfolio Development Course also run at LCC?

Well it’s really important that we define this because these courses are similar in many ways, but have a few really key differences.

The existing PG Dip Portfolio Development course is aimed at established photographers and people who already have a fairly well developed practice. They may not be out there working in the industry directly, but they will have a good portfolio with substantial technical skills and competence. The general idea of that course is to give its students an opportunity to develop their conceptual work and add a new edgier dimension to their portfolio.

If we look at the range of photography courses offered by universities of colleges at the moment, a large majority of them are fine art based. Now, what we’re offering with the Graduate Diploma in Photography is a course for people who want to get out and work in photography.

Work by Manuel Perez de Guzman Luengo, PG Dip Portfolio Development, 2014.

In other words we’ll give students lots of great technical workshops, some photography theory and history, but there will be a strong emphasis on becoming involved in the commercial areas of photography, understanding what it’s like to go out there and work as a practitioner.

It’s been developed with strong links to industry, so you’ll be working with people from industry, most of the lecturers on it will be practicing photographers rather than theorists of fine artists, so that’s a real difference between the courses.

Work by Tomila Akhmadieva, PG Dip Portfolio Development, 2014.

What type of person should be applying to this course?

The type of person we’ll be looking for, for example, is maybe a graduate who has done a fine art course or a course with more of an art focus and wants to pick up on technical skills and wants to build an understanding of the industry and how the commercial sector works.

Or alternatively, someone who wants to make a career change who might not have necessarily been involved directly with the photography industry, but who has built an ok portfolio and is keen to learn or upgrade their technical skills, learn how to put together a professional body of work and see what the industry is about. Whilst there is no set formula for the type of person who should apply, those traits are typical for someone we would look for within that course.

It’s also worth bearing in mind that on the postgraduate course we expect people to have a stronger technical grounding than we would for applicants of the graduate. On the graduate course we will teach you technical skills that you need to know.

Work by Ray Chang, PG Dip Portfolio Development, 2014.

Can you tell us what’s unique about this course?

Well this course is unique, in as much as there are very few other establishments, certainly within the London area, offering this type of course. The private sector are offering a number of these courses, but of course what the private sector can’t offer you is the rich cultural background of LCC and the enormous library and back-up services that LCC has. So yes, there are rival courses, but most of them are limited in what they can actually offer.

Work by Sofya Bredikhina, PG Dip Portfolio Development, 2014.

Are there any specifics in qualifications of people you’re looking to take on?

Well one of the requirements of this course is that you should have a first degree, however, we are quite prepared to look at people who might have alternative experience. If you’re a mature student because you’ve been working for a number of years, that’s another sort of option rather than actually having a degree.

Or if you have a well-developed practice, with a strong portfolio and an interest in photography then obviously we’d also look at you. As I’ve already said, people who want to make career changes are also very important to us.

Work by Manuel Perez de Guzman Luengo, PG Dip Portfolio Development, 2014.

Where does this course sit within LCC? There are several photography courses at LCC, so what should your students be interested in specifically?

The main differences are, say if you studied an MA in photography, you would be working much more as a fine artist. You wouldn’t get any technical workshops on an MA course, and you’d be dealing mostly with conceptual and theoretical aspects of photography. Our course will give you those technical workshops that you might want alongside the conceptual side of studying.

Work by Camilla Greenwell, PG Dip Portfolio Development, 2014.

Where can this course take you?

There are still a great deal of opportunities within the photography market for working within the industry. A lot of the emerging technologies are creating new openings as well, for example in digital operating or picture researching. Certainly though, there are opportunities for graduates from this course as photographers, especially within emerging global markets like China and India, but also here in the UK.