Hi, everyone! I’m currently a high school junior from a small public school in northern NJ who plans on attending college in the fall of 2017. Naturally, I’ve been thinking about where I want to go to school and what I would like to study. (I’ve been looking at schools like Penn State, Syracuse, NYU, Boston University, etc.)
I’m very passionate about all kinds of art, but especially film and theater. My interest sparked when I took a video production course offered at my high school and, since then, I have taken two courses in film production and even have an internship at an award-winning production firm. I planned on majoring in television production for a while and had a lot of support from my parents, peers, etc., but I’ve been rethinking it recently.
Majoring in film always deterred me because I did not want to live the “starving artist” lifestyle. I didn’t want to be stuck with my student loans for a long time and I realized that I want to be able to achieve my dreams and not be held back by something like a college major. Being interested in all kinds of communication, I reconsidered what I actually want to do with my life. (I’ve dabbled in journalism, game design, film production, even biology.) Just to clarify, I never actually wanted to get a traditional Fine Arts film degree, but rather a television-radio degree to open up jobs at places like MTV, NBC Studios, etc.
I was wondering if anyone could give me their opinions on an advertising major as opposed to a television-radio major. I was attracted to it by the fact that positions like art directors and copywriters are given a lot of creative freedom, which is something I definitely am looking for. It seemed a lot more fun and rewarding than standing behind a camera in a television studio. Also, advertising jobs can be quite lucrative farther down the line. I know it’s a difficult industry to break into, but I consider myself a go-getter. Is it worth it? I’ll always be passionate about Film/TV. Can it be equally as fun and artistic? Are the pay and hours worth reconsidering this choice? I appreciate any comments.
(Also, would it be wise to take marketing instead of journalism for my senior year? Thanks!)
You could double major in Marketing (business) and Television (Communications) or choose one of these and minor in the other. The most marketable will probably be Marketing with a minor in Television production/communications.
That was another plan that crossed my mind. However, I’m not very good at math (I hate working with numbers with a burning passion) and marketing seems very much more numbers-based. Is this true with all marketing programs?
If you want to work on TV station you can go to TV production in film school to film and produce TV programs, or to TV journalism to be a TV reporter.
Advertising doesn’t mean work on TV. It means that you create some product (ad campaign, commercial etc) for customer who can use different places - TV, internet, magazines, billboards etc. You often just create the concept or campaign, but don’t make videos/commercials yourself, you subcontract it somewhere.
Some small business that work for ad specialists creating actual videos usually make all kind of products and create all kind of contents. They make commercials, music videos and everything else that is paid.They will make wedding videos if ordered.
So a lot depends not on your education and major but the choice you make with your internships. Because many of these areas are interrelated.
Advertising art direction can be considered something in the communication design department of an art school rather than TV/film specifically. However, obviously ad art directors work on film ad content (film, after all, is a medium).
Syracuse, BU, etc. are excellent choices for film and television - consider Emerson as well, and don’t forget Northwestern which has a pretty famous school of communication.
Thanks for the insight! Yeah, I would definitely want to work in the more creative side of advertising (copywriting, art direction, etc.). I’ll definitely consider these things when choosing internships and courses.
That’s actually a program I was looking into. Art direction/copywriting is definitely a field I’m interested in. However, I’d prefer to stay in the northeastern US, even though Texas does have a very prestigious program.
