Illustration
Entry requirements
96 UCAS Tariff points from a minimum of 2 A Levels (or equivalent), including Grade C in Art, Design or Media subject.
UCAS Tariff Points accepted.
GCSE/National 4/National 5
3 GCSEs at grade C, or grade 4, or above, including English.
UCAS Tariff
UCAS Tariff points from a minimum of 2 A Levels (or equivalent), including Grade C in Art, Design or Media subject.
You may also need to…
Attend an interview
Present a portfolio
About this course
**Hone your illustration skills and learn how to succeed as a professional artist while studying in the creative powerhouse of Cambridge.**
Join a course that scored 94% for Teaching on my Course and 91% for Learning Opportunities in the National Student Survey 2023. With its vibrant studio culture and small class sizes, combined with excellent printmaking, 3D, photography and life-drawing facilities, our illustration course has consistently high student satisfaction ratings.
We know that our students want to learn from the best, so all of our tutors are professional illustrators. They’ll help you find your visual style and kick-start your career. But they’ll never forget the reason you chose to study illustration in the first place. At Cambridge School of Art, you’ll find there’s always time to experiment, discover, discuss and create.
Our studios and workshops are second to none, and you’ll spend lots of time working there. As well as practising and experimenting with your drawing and observation skills, you’ll get the chance to explore related areas such as storytelling, editorials, animation, printmaking, text and image, and moving illustrations.
But you won’t be restricted to the studio: you’ll also go on gallery visits, local drawing trips, and our annual overseas visit to cities such as Porto and Seville, and take part in live briefs for partner organisations. Our students have recently worked with Cambridge University Botanic Garden, producing designs for their educational resources; Cambridge Gateway From India, researching and creating an information board to accompany the new Gateway Stones on Mill Road; and Cambridgeshire Constabulary, creating and exhibiting artworks for their KNOW Violence Against Women project.
We know that your future career is important and you want to build your CV. So we’ll encourage you to grab every opportunity for real-world experience – entering national and international competitions, working on live industry briefs, and taking up internships.
As an illustrator, a world of possibilities awaits you. You could illustrate books, become a graphic artist, design stage sets or product labels, and even work on animated films.
Let us show you where your talents can take you:
- graduating student Tabitha Wall won the ‘New Talent’ category at the hugely prestigious and international World Illustration Awards 2021.
- Bethan Woollvin was awarded the 2022 Book of the Year Prize by Books for Topics, as well as the 2014 Macmillan Prize, The New York Times’ Best Illustrated Children’s Book 2016, and the 2017 World Illustration Awards' 'new talent' category
- Melissa Castrillon is now a full-time freelance illustrator who has won the Society of Illustrators’ Gold Medal and designed covers for Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy
- Lizzie Knott was commissioned by TKMaxx to design a range of t-shirts for Comic Relief.
**Industry-standard facilities**
As well as our dedicated illustration studio, where you’ll have your own desk, you’ll have use of all our creative facilities, including:
- Life drawing studio
- Ruskin Gallery, a professional digital art gallery
- 3D workshops for physical media including wood, plastic, metal, and clay
- Specialist printmaking workshop including etching, screen-printing, and lithography
- Dedicated Mac and PC suites with latest software including Adobe Creative suite
- Photography and media facilities including darkrooms; studios; film processing; digital printing suite; video editing; and professional equipment loans.
**Careers**
The creative industries are booming in the UK, employing more than two million people. With a wealth of careers to choose from, our graduates have found success as book illustrators, graphic designers, luxury homeware designers and more.
There are plenty of opportunities to get your work seen. At the end of your final year, you’ll take part in our degree show and the New Designers exhibition in London.
Modules
Year 1 core modules: Digital and Moving Illustration; Drawing for Illustration; Illustration Practice; Print, Process and Page. Year 2 core modules: Sequence and Narrative; The Illustrated World; Ruskin module. Year 3 Core modules: Portfolio Development; Launchpad. Year 3 optional modules: Practice in Context; Working in the Creative Industries. Modules are subject to change and availability.
Assessment methods
This is a hands-on, practical course and our assessment is based on the coursework you complete for each of your modules. This includes completed project work as well as accompanying material such as sketchbooks. We’re looking to see how you research, analyse and develop your work – in other words, how you think as an illustrator. You’ll also attend lectures and produce written material including essays. We’ll look at these when we’re reviewing your progress.
Tuition fees
Select where you currently live to see what you'll pay:
The Uni
Cambridge Campus
Cambridge School of Art
What students say
We've crunched the numbers to see if overall student satisfaction here is high, medium or low compared to students studying this subject(s) at other universities.
How do students rate their degree experience?
The stats below relate to the general subject area/s at this university, not this specific course. We show this where there isn’t enough data about the course, or where this is the most detailed info available to us.
Design studies
Teaching and learning
Assessment and feedback
Resources and organisation
Student voice
Who studies this subject and how do they get on?
Most popular A-Levels studied (and grade achieved)
After graduation
The stats in this section relate to the general subject area/s at this university – not this specific course. We show this where there isn't enough data about the course, or where this is the most detailed info available to us.
Design studies
What are graduates doing after six months?
This is what graduates told us they were doing (and earning), shortly after completing their course. We've crunched the numbers to show you if these immediate prospects are high, medium or low, compared to those studying this subject/s at other universities.
Top job areas of graduates
What about your long term prospects?
Looking further ahead, below is a rough guide for what graduates went on to earn.
Design studies
The graph shows median earnings of graduates who achieved a degree in this subject area one, three and five years after graduating from here.
£16k
£18k
£23k
Note: this data only looks at employees (and not those who are self-employed or also studying) and covers a broad sample of graduates and the various paths they've taken, which might not always be a direct result of their degree.
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Post-six month graduation stats:
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Graduate field commentary:
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The Longitudinal Educational Outcomes dataset combines HRMC earnings data with student records from the Higher Education Statistics Agency.
While there are lots of factors at play when it comes to your future earnings, use this as a rough timeline of what graduates in this subject area were earning on average one, three and five years later. Can you see a steady increase in salary, or did grads need some experience under their belt before seeing a nice bump up in their pay packet?
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