movies such as star wars indiana jones the shining and the kings speech were shot at hertfordshires elstree studios harry potter films inception and the dark knight found some shooting time at hertfordshires warner bros studio these serve as a virtual training ground too for university of hertfordshire students informs lucy brown programme leader ma film and television the university of hertfordshire prides itself on strong links with the film and tv industry including elstree warner bros the bbc avid bfi british film institute and bafta our faculty members are active in the industry and have worked on highprofile tv shows and films this in turn gives our students fantastic opportunities to develop their filmmaking skills one of their ongoing research efforts includes the elstree project meant to enable students to hone their filmmaking skills and film history knowledge through interviews with key elstree veterans including brian blessed and roger moore this project began in 2010 with an aim to help candidates build professional links within the uk and international film and television industry shares brown apart from helping students learn advanced producing directing and screenwriting techniques the university is going to organise a trip to the cannes film festival in may 2015 this postgraduate degree provides a practical and intensive study of filmmaking in an environment that encourages experimentation professional development and cuttingedge ideas and thats why trips such as these help our students immensely elaborates brown the combination of creative technical practical and management skills make this course unique says victoria woodward international officer at the university adds sayyed sabbagh a 2013 graduate the first two terms offer a combination of sessions on all three aspects of producing directing and writing as well as theory sessions that encouraged us to analyse and discuss films in depth in term three we produce an independent film and tutors are always available to help the students