Photography and Related Media

photo shoot by FIT photography college students

Both art and craft, professional photography requires an individual creative vision, a mastery of skills and tools, and the acumen to get your work seen. In this program, you’ll learn to communicate complex ideas through images. Working in our well-equipped studios and in a close-knit community of students and faculty, you’ll study camera formats, lighting, and photo styling, and become proficient in digital and analog photography.

Whatever your interest — photojournalism, advertising, fashion, fine art — you’ll shape your identity as a visual artist and graduate ready to tell compelling stories through your lens.

The two-year Associate in Applied Science (AAS) is a thorough introduction to photography. Here, you’ll learn digital and analog still photography, black and white printing, color theory, and digital post-production. You’ll learn the skills needed to create a portfolio and start a career in photography, though many students go on to the two-year BFA program.

Degree Details

You’ll learn about lighting, composition, retouching, and professional business practices while gaining hands-on experience in both studio and location settings, exploring portraiture, fashion, still life, documentary, and video art. You will also tap into a vast network of contacts in New York City through seminars, guest lectures, and industry events. In your last semester, you’ll engage in a required internship and be challenged to create work that’s provocative, evocative, relevant, and timeless.

If you have an AAS in Photography and Related Media from FIT, you may apply. Learn more about eligibility for this program.

Degree Details

We shape visual narratives with images that grab the eye and the mind.

Sarai Garcia, Photography ’20, who’s published in New York, Flanelle, and other outlets, describes her work as “a celebration and love letter to women, BIPOC, and LGBTQ+ identities,”.

FIT student photographers highlighted fall fashion trends for the September 2020 issue of Elle. Ni Ouyang, Gabrielle Spiegel, Lucy Borden, and Killian Nelson held photo shoots in Coney Island, Brooklyn, and the Jersey Shore.

Our graduating students capture powerful moments, including Thomas Giarraffa’s project that brings attention to subjects like addiction, isolation, and disasters.

José A. Alvarado Jr., Photography ’13, documented the path Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez took as she campaigned for a seat in the House of Representatives.

Student Work

Stand out in an image-saturated world … Use imagery to say what words can’t express—in ways you never imagined.

This [analog] technique, while teaching me about the origins and the science behind photography, also opened my mind about how to use all the resources available to create meaningful art.

Isabella HanleyPhotography student

Talented and skilled photographers are in high demand. Students have interned at Saturday Night Live, Refinery 29, Vice, Vogue, Nan Goldin, Lois Greenfield, Brooklyn Museum, Richard Avedon Foundation, major ad agencies, and InStyle. Graduates enter the industry as studio assistants, commercial photographers, editorial photographers, video editors, photography directors, curators, photo editors at magazines and stock agencies, art buyers at advertising agencies, and retouchers.

Beyond Graduation

woman standing in shadow looking into the distance

Explore All Programs

Our faculty of professional photographers will prepare you with the skills and knowledge you need to reach your goals as a visual artist. Meet more Photography and Related Media faculty.

Jessica Wynne

Named one of 30 top emerging photographers by Photo District News, Wynne’s work has appeared at the Whitney Museum of American Art at Champion, CT; the Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art; The Museum at FIT; and DNA Gallery in Provincetown, MA. She is an associate professor of Photography.

Brian Emery

Emery uses photographic processes to examine the experience of place. He began his career as a visual effects artist for advertising photography and went on to create iPrint Analog/Digital Lab, an eminent fashion retouching and fine art printing boutique in Manhattan. More recently he was awarded a fellowship in 3D visualization from the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and a national parks artist residency at the Gettysburg National Battlefield. He is currently making video works in and about the woods of southern Vermont. He is an associate professor of Photography.

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