MA Immersive Media
MA Immersive Media prepares students to translate their creative knowledge and digital skills into engaging immersive content and public media experiences for diverse audiences in this exciting and rapidly growing sector. Learning is conducted through a unique partnership with Real Ideas’ Market Hall in Plymouth, home to Europe’s largest Immersive Dome.
Dive into a world of immersive technology with MA Immersive Media at Arts University Plymouth.
<p dir="ltr"><strong>MA Immersive Media</strong> prepares students to translate their creative knowledge and digital skills into engaging immersive content and public media experiences for diverse audiences in this exciting and rapidly growing sector. Learning is conducted through our unique partnership with <a href="https://real-immersive.realideas.org/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"><strong>Real Ideas'</strong></a> Market Hall in Plymouth, home to one of Europe’s largest Immersive Domes.</p>
Real Ideas' Immersive Dome at Market Hall in Devonport, Plymouth. Image credit: Jay Stone
<p dir="ltr">Led by expert staff and creative practitioners with pioneering experience in immersive media and digital world building, students on this course learn to develop original digital content for public spaces, including for a 360-degree dome optimised for audience engagement. </p>
<p dir="ltr">Working within this state-of-the-art dome facility, student projects are created for 8k visual projection and a 19.1 audio speaker array. In addition to developing media for fully contained immersion, students are introduced to a wide range of related technologies and approaches to frameless media, including Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR) and Mixed Reality (MR), experienced through passive and interactive formats such as animation, game environments, spatial audio, 360 recorded and real-time video content, among other forms.</p>
A packed audience watching a show at Real Ideas' Immersive Dome in Market Hall, Devonport. Image credit: Jay Stone
<p dir="ltr">Combining academic excellence with teaching from highly experienced industry specialists, MA Immersive Media will enable students to make engaging immersive content and media experiences for diverse audiences in the rapidly growing creative and digital sector in Plymouth and the South West. Through a sequence of three 60-credit units over the year (or over two years part-time), students will develop an individual or collaborative research project, realised through the taught use of immersive technologies, to production standards that will fully prepare them for employment in any of the many sectors now embracing this emerging cultural form.</p>
A dancer is silhouetted against the projections in the Immersive Dome at Market Hall. Image credit: Immersive Me
<p dir="ltr">Arts University Plymouth has primary expertise and research focus in immersive genres that have emerged from fine art, games, film and animation, and which conceptually intersect around practices such as installation art, 360 degree filmmaking, critical digital culture, social gaming and worldbuilding. The university’s background and historical commitment to social justice infuse our teaching of these creative practices with a focus on the shared, public contexts of immersive media, allowing students to develop their ideas beyond mere technical know-how, to develop media which meaningfully impacts human relationships and our relationship to the environment. With this focused expertise and opportunity to develop immersive media within a social context through our partnership with Real Ideas as a social enterprise, MA Immersive Media is a crucible for aesthetic innovation that is uniquely attuned to the human aspects of immersive experiences that will give graduates a unique advantage within this industry.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Applications explored and possible outcomes for immersive media include those in: games and entertainment industries; museums and heritage sectors; marketing, advertising, and tourism; art and architecture; product development; data/information design; science education and visualisation; medicine and and healthcare.</p>
<p dir="ltr">We are committed to developing ethical, sustainable design practices as outlined in our <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/strategic-plan">Strategic Vision</a> and this ethos is embedded in all MA courses.</p>
<p dir="ltr"><strong>We place you at the forefront of digital culture</strong>. Immersive media is an expanding area of practice that encompasses both industry standards and an exciting exploration of new forms of art which is blurring the lines between real life and digital experience. Our MA Immersive Media course places you at the forefront of the emerging creative and societal forces that are shaping how and why we engage with virtual worlds, reimagining what it means to live in the 21st century. </p>
<p dir="ltr"><strong>A pro-active, Interdisciplinary community</strong>. Creative ideas and design practices do not develop in isolation. You come to university to be challenged, supported and to take risks in a context that will inspire you to innovate and understand design as an active process of inquiry into market demands, new technologies, transforming supply chains and challenges to our environment. The course encourages conceptual exploration and hands-on iteration through multiple disciplines and cultures of making. </p>
<p dir="ltr"><strong>Accelerated personal development through guided, practice-led research</strong>. We believe design is a research-led enquiry into human relationships with each other and our planetary ecosystem. This enquiry is pursued through an iterative, material-led examination of the links between human need, human behaviour and human community, leading to new insights and solutions. Your personal learning is accelerated through common units navigated via your individual discipline and professional objectives. </p>
<p dir="ltr"><strong>World-class workshops and facilities</strong>: During your time on the course, you will have access to one of the most diverse and spacious ecosystems of workshops, studios and labs known in a contemporary art and design school. Our FabLab is the first of its kind in the UK and gives you access to state-of-the-art resources for developing 21st century skills that will prepare you for leading new design methods and creative practices, making you adept at navigating media’s complex interfaces.</p>
<p dir="ltr"><strong>Sustainable ethos and specialist knowledge</strong>: Built into our Postgraduate programme is an emphasis on the sustainable, non-extractive and regenerative approaches to working with materials, which not only provides a meaningful link between the past and the future of design, but puts you at the forefront of contemporary design thinking aimed at developing new, more sustainable industries. We provide an opportunity to develop specialist practices that give you the tools and knowledge to contribute to a growing design sector focused on building a circular economy.</p>
<p>Arts University Plymouth graduates are offered a <strong>discount of 15% on Masters programme fees</strong>, regardless of when they studied with us previously. The discount applies if you studied on one of our pre-degree, foundation or undergraduate programmes.</p>
<p>MA applicants are normally expected to have an undergraduate degree at 2:2 or above. However, the strength of your creative practice and other forms of experience will be taken into account at the interview stage and we encourage you to start a conversation with us.</p>
<p>Your portfolio should give us an indication of the work that you have made, organised or been involved in. For our postgraduate arts, craft and design courses, we expect to see examples of work you have created. </p>
<p>For our MA Museum Studies, and MA Immersive Media courses, we don't expect you to have traditional artworks; instead you can share examples of projects you have worked on, classroom experiences you have created, and so on. Please ensure that your portfolio includes descriptions, website links and visuals if they are available.</p>
<p>The best deadline to submit your MA application by is <strong>1 July</strong>, however please be reassured that we can take late applications until the start of the course if places are still available.</p>
<ul><li><strong>Email: </strong><a href="mailto:admissions@aup.ac.uk">admissions@aup.ac.uk</a></li><li><strong>Tel:</strong> +44 (0)1752 203434</li></ul>
<p>Click the button below to book an informal online chat with Associate Professor <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/people/stephanie-owens">Stephanie Owens</a>, Dean of Arts, Design & Media.</p>
