Hello SF friends!

Because I am in NYC for the summer,last week I decided to take a took a tour of the NYU Tisch film building and meet with some people to talk about the grad film program. I thought I would share my findings,opinions, highlights/concerns of the program with the good folk at SF. This site has always been a great place to get info for me, so I figured I would give back a little bit.

At NYU, you go on a self guided tour, but if you stop and talk to people in the building they will answer any questions you have.

Ok, lets start with the facility:

Let me start by saying, this building isn't too hard on the eyes. The Tisch building is very modern, decked out with hardwood floors, brick walls with trendy stainless steal accenting and lots of cool lighting that changes color. Most of the film floors are on the 8th story of the building and above which offers a great view of the NYC skyline. And when you walk the halls, tons of framed movie posters line the walls, all being films NYU alumni have worked on (many them were signed by the filmmakers too). What can I say, I'm a sucker for the visuals.

Ok, now down to the more technical stuff. There is a decent size FCP lab, but unfortunately I was told these machines were more for "beginners" and each only had one monitor. They also had an Avid lap with about 25 computers and each of these had two monitors. There were also were about 10 single room editing bays that could be checked out.

There are two animation rooms equipped with Flash, AE, Maya, and I believe an open source stop motion software. The department is kind of small, but the lady who ran the floor(I also think she said she taught a few classes) and showed me around was super nice.

I also saw one of the television studios they had in the building. Apparently there are two of them of them, but the one I saw looked nice but it was rather small. The equipment looked pretty up to date.

I saw the equipment checkout rooms as well. I got a pretty good look at the lighting room and they seemed to have a TON of equipment. I was told that they have lots of digital cameras, HD cameras, 16 mm, 35 mm, and they were pretty excited because they just got a new RED camera.

That's all I say about the building really, there wasn't a lot going on with it being the summer and all. I don't know the policy for other grad film programs, but NYU doesn't run during the summer to give the grad students a break/chance to work on other projects/chance to get real world experience.

Now I will tell you what I learned about the admissions process and other little snidbits I found out. Sorry if this part is a little unorganized, I am sort of typing it as it comes to me.

NYU only accepts around 35 students to the program each year. They generally receive about 600-800 applications a year. You do not need to take the GRE to attend the program and the program is 3 years long.

I was told that the tuition is $35,000 a year (not including room and board, but I was told there were a lot of scholarships and financial aid available. For receiving money, I was told that the first year is the hardest, but the next two are a lot easier. They are working on making the third year free for all the students and currently they are close by offering something like $20,000 to third years.

Paying for you films is somewhat budgeted into your tuition, you are given like $1,700 for your first big one and $3,000 for your thesis (I don't quite remember the specifics, but it was around these figures). They said that NYU provides the equipment, but all of the auxiliary costs are on you--whether that's food, actors you need to hire, props, ect.

The program is organized as a conserviatory. I will tell you the positives and negatives I saw with this set up. First the positives:

They do not have specific slots for directors, cinematographers, producers like other programs. This is good because if 25 of the people want to be directors, they don't care. They said this takes the "cutthroat aspect out because you don't need to compete to get you films made." Everyone works on everyone else's projects. I was told NYU has it set up this way because they see a lot of people coming in wanting to be directors then discovering they like cinematogrpahy or editing more and by making everyone learn everything, not only are they more well rounded filmmakers, but they may find a job they like better. Another positive thing about the conserviatory setup is that this program fosters the writer/director type as apposed to just a strictly directing track approach. Also, with the program being 3 years, the advisors said that their students do not feel as rushed as with some 2 year programs.

The potential negatives:

The fact that is is a conservatory setting as opposed to have spots specifically for directors, cinematographers, producers, ect. is that if you KNOW what you want to do, you will have mess around with stuff you might not want to be doing. And from what I gained from my talk, that's a lot of the first year: exploration. So, if you are dead set on what you want to do, I could for see some annoyance to this approach. And if there are so many chiefs in this program and not enough indians, I can foresee some issues.

Getting Accepted:

Like I said earlier, they accept around 35 people to the program from about 600-800 applications from around the world. The selection process is broken down into 3 parts. First thing they look at is your portfolio. They said it doesn't have to be high quality stuff, they just want to see that you can tell a story. After that, they go the essays. They want to know what you want to bring to table and how NYU fits into making those goals a possibility. Then after that, you have to do in person interviews or via skype if you can't make it to NYC. They interview about 150 in person and then make their selection of 35 people. I am not sure where this fits in, during the interview or essay, but they want you to have an idea of a dream project you want to accomplish either while you are there or by preparing for it during your time at NYU.


So there you have it, my big, long post that I am sure is filled with spelling mistakes and grammar problems, but I don't feel like editing it. I hope I didn't offend any NYU people with some of my opinions, they were just some initial thoughts I had about the program.

Let me know what you guys think! All the best.

hey there! i got into this program for this coming fall and am enrolled, and yes that all sounds about right. the future film idea isn't so concrete though, and its one of the components of the application, a one page summary of a feature film idea, so it's not necessarily a part of your essay or interview. They told me that they received close to a 1000 applicants and 100 interviewees. It's all the same, though. Good luck with the process if you go through with it- it's a roller coaster, I can promise you that. Feel free to shoot me any questions if you want!

Nice post, guy!

I am glad you guys found the post helpful. I tried to find out as much info as I could. I hope that the post was able to alleviate some worries/concerns/questions people had.

Glad I could help!

Hung out with a good friend from NYU last night, who was in LA getting his thesis footage transferred at FotoKem.

We had other things to chat about, but here are some interesting facts he shared:

His thesis cost almost $40K and he got little aid from the school.

He's in his sixth year of the program, said several people go to year seven...but NYU charges you next to nothing after three years.

FYI.

He loves the program.

Sixth year? ****! How come so long?

Seven years???? He could be a doctor. Is it a part time thing when it's that long?

I know that for some of the programs/schools, largely due to the overwhelming expense and scholastic timing restraints, MFA candidates do not immediately graduate after completing their coursework. NYU being one of the more demanding and nearly the most expensive, I'm sure many of candidates don't graduate at the end of 3 years. While I'm not sure I'll apply to Chapman again, they seem to have a more streamlined program ensuring graduation in a timely fashion.

I believe it's similar to Columbia's five year plan, where you still have liberal access to equipment and resources and retain student/loan deferment status but pay minimal fees.

USC also tends to take four years, though they advertise it as three.

7 years still seems excessive to be out of the workforce for so long.

It sounds to me that the programs can be completed in the 2-3 years time-frame suggested (depending on the which school) and this whole taking "7 years" business must be contingent on how much time you want to spend on your thesis film.

Am I right in this assumption?

quote:

Originally posted by apex:
It sounds to me that the programs can be completed in the 2-3 years time-frame suggested (depending on the which school) and this whole taking "7 years" business must be contingent on how much time you want to spend on your thesis film.

Am I right in this assumption?

The program is 3 years of classes. You then can matriculate for a couple of years to make your thesis, if you choose.

Some don't and graduate right away (rare, maybe one student every couple of years) after three years.

Most graduate after 5 or 6 years (it goes even higher). THe fact is that a lot of people end up freelancing and paying bills. It's easy because you don't have to pay back student loans, cheap health care, no classes, why not?
Also, people raise money for their thesis films, which gets expensive.

Some folks try to get a feature written/produced which takes YEARS to do. SIN NOMBRE is a great example of that, which is considered an NYU thesis film, but took years to do.

Ultimately, people want to be happy and want to want to make their films because it involves a huge financial and time commitment.

The current admin/faculty is trying hard to get a class graduated under 5 years, and it is working, but the vast majority of students still take 5+ years, no one is complaining.

As I mentioned, my friend had no complaints. It seems like a good setup, actually, now that you've shared more details, duders...the minimal fees seem like they provide a chance to be eased into the field without the stresses of a crazy class schedule and a huge loan payment, rather than killing yourself to get out at some date and not being ready.

My only question is, again and again, why won't the production programs be realistic when they sell their programs?

That makes more sense now duders...thanks.