Overview
Whether you're applying for a Foundation, Undergraduate or Postgraduate degree, we're here to help
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Portfolio Guidelines
For the majority of our courses, we'll invite you to attend an interview and ask you to bring a portfolio with you as part of the application process.
Portfolios should show examples of your work – both finished and work in progress – that demonstrate your interests and skills.
We've created specific portfolio guidelines for each of our courses. You can take a look at these below.
Undergraduate Degrees
- BA (Hons) Acting
- BA (Hons) Animation Production
- BA (Hons) Architecture
- BA (Hons) Commercial Photography
- BA (Hons) Costume
- BA (Hons) Costume and Performance Design
- BA (Hons) Dance
- BA (Hons) Design
- BA (Hons) Fashion
- BA (Hons) Fashion Branding and Communication
- BA (Hons) Film Production
- BA (Hons) Fine Art
- BA (Hons) Graphic Design
- BA (Hons) Interior Architecture and Design
- BA (Hons) Illustration
- BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance
- BA (Hons) Modelmaking
- BA (Hons) Performance Design and Film Costume
- BA (Hons) Photography
- BA (Hons) Textiles
- BA (Hons) Visual Communication
- BA (Hons) Visual Effects Design and Production
Postgraduate
Here's our top tips on how to prepare your portfolio:
Send us your digital portfolio
We understand that it isn’t possible for some applicants, especially those living outside the UK, to attend an interview. If this is the case, we’ll assess your application on your UCAS form and your portfolio.
We’ll send you instructions on how to submit your portfolio via MyApplication (you don’t need to send us your portfolio until you hear from us). Please make sure that any links that you send aren’t password protected, or we won't be able to view them.
Flickr and Behance are good to use for digital portfolios as they offer a smooth viewing experience, allow space for background notes and make sending the portfolio as easy as pasting a link into an email.
You can also build your own website to present your work. This demonstrates your web design skills and gives you complete control over presentation and style.
Dropbox and WeTransfer are other useful services for sending large files over the internet, but pay attention to presentation and viewer experience. A Behance portfolio will be more impressive than a folder of standalone image files.
If you’d prefer to attach your portfolio to an email, be sure to keep the file size under 9MB, or the email won’t come through.
YouTube and Vimeo are great for Animation or Film portfolios but you should avoid these platforms for stills-based work because they don’t allow the viewer to control the amount of time that they spend looking at each piece of work.
Remember: if you’re not going to be attending an interview in person, you won’t be able to explain the ideas behind your work. It’s therefore important that you provide background notes on each piece of work about your processes and conceptual thinking.
