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Learning Outcomes
The Digital Media Production Certificate Program offers foundational knowledge applicable to a wide range of current media-related professions. You will have the opportunity to develop production skills, achieve technical proficiency, and make sophisticated choices in the creation of digital media.
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Courses are now available in an online or distance learning style. For information on delivery format, cost, course descriptions, and exact class meeting days and times, see the individual course descriptions (where applicable). All of the course times are in Eastern Standard Time. Please activate your Emerson email account after registering for a course so that you can receive any course-related messages from your professors.
Certificate Requirements
- To earn the certificate, complete a minimum of 75 hours (7.5 CEUs) from courses offered in the Digital Media series.
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Faculty
Instructors are scheduled based on availability. Faculty bios are included on each course page. Frequent instructors include:
- Emily Hofelich
- David Kelleher
- Allyson Sherlock
- Warren Smith
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Documentary Film Schools: 9 Best programs to apply to
Documentary filmmaking is an amazing way to express ideas to a large audience in a way that’s fun and informational at the same time. You can go to some specialized documentary film schools to learn how to make documentaries.
Even though film schools in the United States are many, there aren’t many that offer a specific program targeted to documentary filmmaking.
Some programs are affiliated with universities but mostly independent, and others may have a few courses within the filmmaking department. Other colleges may have documentary filmmaking-specific courses under the journalism or communications programs.
This actually makes sense, since there are so many different kinds of documentaries: feature films, TV shows, or even short films.
Below, we have listed what we feel are the best documentary film programs and schools. Remember that each kind of program has its own format, so you’ll need to consider that before you apply. In some cases, you’ll just be able to sign up for the course.
In other cases, you’ll need to enroll into a larger degree program, and in other cases, you can find documentary making classes within other liberal arts programs.
Film schools that have documentary filmmaking courses
1. Stanford University MFA program in Documentary Film and Video
MFA stands for Masters of Fine Arts, and the Stanford program is one of the top documentary filmmaking programs available. The program is 2 years, and incredibly exclusive: only 8 students are accepted every year. Once you graduate, you can teach documentary filmmaking at university level yourself.
Throughout the course, you will learn about the artistic side of filmmaking as well as the history, skills you can use to make documentaries, and of course, the assignments you complete will help you form a portfolio of documentaries before you graduate.
2. University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts
Our next choice for the top documentary film school isn’t necessarily number 2 on the list, but we would consider it on par or even better than the Stanford University program.
While the focus of the program is not specifically on documentaries, students can choose to focus on fiction and non-fiction filmmaking.
Fiction and non-fiction both go hand in hand in making compelling films. Learning fiction filmmaking helps you tell a good story that keeps your audience hooked, and learning non-fiction filmmaking will help you make better characters and let you develop more realistic and believable stories.
Liberal arts colleges with film courses
3. Columbia College Chicago
Home to the largest film school program in the United States, Columbia College Chicago is unique among liberal arts colleges. On the surface, it would seem like any other liberal arts college and the courses they offer are quite similar. However, they have a large Cinema Art and Science department, which has the Michael Rabiger Center for Documentary Film.
Columbia College Chicago offers more than 30 classes in documentary filmmaking. Most of these will be part of the Cinema Arts and Science program but some courses will fall under the Television department too.
4. American University School of Communications
The Center for Media and Social Impact at the American University School of Communications literally wrote the book on documentary filmmaking. They have published the Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use, which is still considered to be the manual for documentary films.
Interestingly enough, the American University also has a dedicated sub-specialization within filmmaking called the Center for Environmental Filmmaking, which makes this school a huge plus for students who wish to specialize in environmental and nature films.
5. UC Berkeley School of Journalism (Documentary Film Program)
UC Berkeley has one of the best Journalism Schools in the United States. Within the Journalism school, you can learn about documentary filmmaking. The unique thing about UC Berkeley is a focus on television documentaries(not necessary feature films).
Television documentaries are growing in demand and popularity, and final submissions by students are often picked up for primetime broadcasting by PBS and cable TV networks.
Students’ projects also get regular exposure in regional broadcasts and at film festivals.
6. Duke University Center for Documentary Studies
One of the first documentary film programs in the USA is at Duke University. The Center for Documentary Studies has a very wide array of classes that lead into a documentary filmmaking education. These start with comparatively simple topics like photography and build up into the production and academic facets of making documentaries.
Duke is home to the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival which takes place annually and is one of the best documentary film festivals in the country.
You can opt to enter their undergrad program, work on an MFA, or take their continuing education classes which anyone can enroll in during the summer.
Documentary film courses
7. Maine Media Documentary Film School
At Maine Media you can attend a four week workshop on documentary filmmaking. You’ll participate in hands-on sessions in making documentaries. The topics you’ll study include researching, developing, producing, editing, and how to work as a team. Films created through the program have been featured at festivals and broadcasted nationally on public television.
8. New York Film Academy
Interestingly enough, the New York Film Academy’s documentary workshop/course is offered in both New York City and Los Angeles. This is a one year course divided into two semesters.
You’ll start out with the history of the subject matter, as well as the artistic side of it, and you’ll progress to hands-on filmmaking as well. You’ll be shooting various documentaries during this program and your passing will be subject to a completed thesis film.
9. George Washington University
George Washington University has a six month program for learning documentary filmmaking. It is very intense and covers a lot of subject matter, split into two. The first is the history of documentary film and why it is such an important genre, mixed in with some camera workshops.
The second is a project where the students work as a group to create a short documentary all the way from concept to final product.
You will learn about everything including genres, lighting, shooting, editing, and screenwriting.
What Are The Best Documentary Film Schools?
What Are The Best Documentary Film Schools?
In the United States, there are many film schools, however not every college or institution has a documentary film department. Some documentary film programs are self-contained entities separate from a larger college, while others provide a menu of documentary filmmaking courses within a film school at a liberal arts college, where you will be expected to take other classes to complete a four-year degree. Others may offer documentary film classes through their television, journalism, or communications departments. There are many distinct forms of documentary films, just as there are many different sorts of documentary journalism (such as feature length docs in cinemas vs. Discovery Channel TV documentaries vs. 60 Minutes short branded doc journalism).
Here is our guide to some of the best documentary film schools and documentary film programs:
If you’re interested in going to a documentary film school, it’s important to consider the approach of each school that you may be interested in researching. So we’ve organized the following documentary filmmaking programs into a three different categories: self contained documentary units that you can take without enrolling at a college/university, and documentary film programs within larger film schools or schools that are primarily film schools, and documentary film programs or centers within liberal arts colleges (though there is some overlap between the last two categories with certain colleges).
Self Contained Documentary Film Courses
George Washington University’s Graduate Certificate Program
GWU’s Institute for Documentary Filmmaking offers a six month (January-June) intensive documentary filmmaking course. The program is split into two sections: first, an intensive dive into the history and concept of documentary film combined with technical camera workshops, and then second from May through June a capstone project where students work together to develop and produce a short documentary film. Course topics include an introduction to documentary film genres, workshops in lighting, shooting and editing, pitch sessions and documentary screenwriting.
Maine Media Documentary Film School Program
Maine Media Workshops + College offers an annual four week documentary filmmaking workshop where students focus on hands on learning to craft short documentaries. During the summer workshop, students learn about how to research, develop, produce and edit a documentary film and work together in a group. Class films in the past have screened at film festivals and aired on PBS. MMWC also offers other stand-alone documentary film courses which you can find on their website.
New York Film Academy Documentary Conservatory
Offered in both New York City and Los Angeles, the NYFA’s documentary conservatory is a one year documentary filmmaking program split into two semesters (3 for LA). This intensive program focuses somewhat on the history of documentary film and the art of the genre itself but more on practical documentary filmmaking. Students learn how to make documentaries by making them as part of this year-long program. Students exit the program with a thesis documentary film of up to 30 minutes in length.
Film Schools Teaching Documentary Making Courses
University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts
USC has perhaps the top film school in the country and they have plenty of opportunities for students to work on honing their documentary filmmaking skills. Explains USC professor Mark Harris (winner of 3 Academy Awards): “We don’t have a program as much as an emphasis in documentary. Although graduate students can concentrate on documentary filmmaking, most take courses in both fiction and nonfiction filmmaking. We see them as complementary. Fiction courses help documentarians to tell better stories by giving them structural and narrative tools; documentaries help fiction filmmakers create more realistic and nuanced characters and more believable stories.”
Stanford University MFA Program in Documentary Film and Video
Stanford’s Film and Media Studies program offers one of the best documentary film MFAs available. Its two-year program accepts 8 new students per year and graduates are qualified to teach documentary film themselves at the university level. As you might expect from a documentary program housed within an Art & Art History Department, Stanford approaches documentary film as art, aesthetics and social awareness. Graduate documentary students learn about the history of documentary film and also learn practical documentary filmmaking skills and exit the program with a portfolio of documentary work.
Liberal Arts Colleges Offering Documentary Filmmaking Courses
UC Berkley School of Journalism Documentary Film Program
UC Berkeley offers one of the best documentary film programs in the country with a focus on documentary as journalism (not necessarily as film). It’s nestled within the Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism and as such prepares largely prepares its students to work in television documentary film (an ever-expanding field). According to the program, students’ final projects are “venturesome, meaningful, and suitable for wide prime-time distribution via PBS, commercial networks, or cable TV. Every year several master’s project films are picked up for nationwide prime-time broadcast, and nearly all have regional broadcast and extensive exposure at film festival.”
American University School of Communications
The name American University School of Communications probably sounds familiar to a lot of documentary filmmakers because its Center for Media & Social Impact published the extremely well known Documentary Filmmakers’ Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use document, which remains the authoritative document on the subject. Patricia Aufderheide, one of the most experts on fair use in documentary film also teaches at AUSOC. Additionally, American University School of Communications also has its own dedicated Center for Environmental Filmmaking, that will be of particular interest to any aspiring documentary filmmakers interested in producing nature or environmental documentaries considering documentary film school.
Columbia College Chicago
While Columbia College Chicago is technically a liberal arts college, meaning it offers the same number of classes and departments that any other college would, it also houses America’s largest film school program, which means film gets a lot more attention than it might at other liberal arts schools with only communications programs. Within Columbia College’s enormous Cinema Art + Science department is the Michael Rabiger Center for Documentary Film, named after a former professor there who wrote one of the most well known instructional books on documentary filmmaking, Directing the Documentary. CCC offers over thirty classes in documentary film, primarily in its Cinema Arts + Science department but also in its Television department as well.
Duke University Center for Documentary Studies
At 25, The Duke University Center for Documentary Studies is one of the oldest dedicated documentary film schools in the United States. CDS offers scores of documentary filmmaking classes which start with still photography and transition into documentary film, covering both practical production aspects and also academic documentary filmmaking studies. Duke also hosts hosts the prestigious Full Frame Documentary Film Festival each year, one of North America’s top documentary film festivals. Duke’s Center for Documentary Studies offers three options for studying documentary film: their normal undergraduate program, an MFA in documentary film, and a continuing education courses that any adult can enroll in during the summertime.
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