Sound Design
Entry requirements
A level
Pearson BTEC Level 3 National Extended Diploma (first teaching from September 2016)
UCAS Tariff
A typical offer will be a UCAS Tariff score of 88 - 112. A minimum of two full A-levels (or equivalent) is required. Every application is considered on an individual basis.
About this course
This degree programme provides a practical, theoretical and creative grounding in sound design across multiple industry areas, from music production to movie soundtracks, games audio, and beyond. Using industry-standard studio and live sound facilities, you’ll learn skills including professional recording and mixing techniques, how to evaluate newly emerging practices and studio technologies and build a portfolio of your personal sound work and projects.
**Why study this subject?**
With a degree in sound design you could be working in post-production, outside broadcast, tv and film production, live music events, or for an audio supplier or broadcaster such as Sky or the BBC. You would use your studio and music production skills as part of team to create appropriate audio to demonstrate atmosphere, tempo or overall effect.
**Why study at Buckinghamshire New University?**
BNU pioneered music business and management degrees over 20 years ago. You’ll get to work in a production-house style environment, collaborating frequently with students from our other courses and with external partners on live projects. You might design sounds to accompany an animated creature created in the university’s motion-capture studio, or work with Film & TV Production students to produce sound and music for a sci-fi scene. You could also implement sound using game engine tools with our games development students.
Honing your skills on real projects, you’ll build an extensive portfolio of work examples and experiences.
All our music degrees at BNU come with membership of UK Music’s Music Academic Partnership (MAP), a ground-breaking collaboration between educational institutions and UK Music, designed to maximise the relationship between the industry and educational institutions in order to inform the next generation of industry professionals.
**What facilities can I use?**
Our state-of-the-art recording studios and Dolby Atmos certified sound lab give you access to the space and technology you need. From individual edit rooms up to large Pro Tools Ultimate studios with attached live rooms and vocal booths, we have it all to help you gain hands-on experience. Studio 1 boasts a Dolby Atmos 7.1.4 speaker system and an Avid S6 console. We are one of the first Universities in the UK to adopt Dolby Atmos into a music environment. Studio 2 boasts an Avid D-Command control surface and 24 channels of Focusrite ISA828 microphone preamps. Studio three and the Electronic Music Studio are based around Avid S3/S4 control surfaces and UAD Apollo x8 audio interfaces. The edit booths are equipped with microphone preamps from Avid.
**What will I study?**
The course covers all the relevant building blocks of sound design. In addition to core recording and mixing skills, you’ll also get to grips with areas such as audio programming and synthesis, game engines and audio middleware, field sound recording, experimental composition and digital instrument design, and spatial audio.
You’ll learn about technology and sound production, and audio principles, theories and practices, and be introduced to the sound and computing technologies used in audio studios and elsewhere. You’ll build on, and apply, these skills to more specific production areas as the course progresses, focussing on areas including live sound, audio drama, sounds for games and VR, and film sound design, before completing a specialist major research project in your final year.
Opportunity modules are a key part of the BNU curriculum. You’ll choose modules in both your first and second year from a broad selection in areas such as sustainability, entrepreneurship, creativity, digital skills, personal growth, civic engagement, health & wellbeing and employment. Opportunity modules are designed to enable you to develop outside the traditional boundaries of your discipline and help you to further stand out from the crowd to future employers.
Modules
**Year one**
**Core**
Audio Production Technologies
Live Audio
Recording and Mixing Techniques
Computer Programming for Audio Applications
Sound Design for Moving Image
**Opportunity**
2 x 10 credit year one Opportunity modules
**Year two**
**Core**
Location Sound & Post-production
Sound Design for Non-linear Media
Research Methods
**Optional**
Creative Audio Production
Electronic Production Techniques
Sound Design Projects
Genre Studies
**Opportunity**
2 x 10 credit year two Opportunity modules
**Year three**
**Core**
Sound Design and Sonic Installation
Immersive Audio Techniques
Dissertation/Independent Work
**Optional**
Professional Production Project
Game Audio: Techniques and Practices
Sound Design Final Portfolio
Podcasting – Creation & Production
Assessment methods
Teaching on the course is highly practical and hands-on with a focus on real production work working within our industry standard studios and sound facilities. The staff on this course have a wealth of professional and academic experience, with many still working in industry.
You’ll also learn through group discussion and one-to-one interaction with tutors, as well as through lectures, workshops and master classes.
A variety of assessment methods will be used as appropriate to the modules you take, including essays, reports, portfolios of creative audio content, written evaluations, presentations, and some continuous assessment on practical tasks. Assessments will be appropriate to the task, achievable, motivating and vocationally focussed, forming a constructive part of your learning process.
Tuition fees
Select where you currently live to see what you'll pay:
Extra funding
Buckinghamshire New University offers a range of bursaries and scholarships. For more information, please visit https://www.bucks.ac.uk/study/fees-and-funding/financial-support-bursaries-and-scholarships
The Uni
Buckinghamshire New University
School of Creative And Digital Industries
What students say
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How do students rate their degree experience?
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Music
Teaching and learning
Assessment and feedback
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Student voice
Who studies this subject and how do they get on?
Most popular A-Levels studied (and grade achieved)
After graduation
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Music
What are graduates doing after six months?
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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.
Music
The graph shows median earnings of graduates who achieved a degree in this subject area one, three and five years after graduating from here.
£15k
£18k
£20k
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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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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