Now Luke can aim for media career

From: ic Berkshire.co.uk, UK - Aug 31, 2005

DEAF student Luke Blackburn is delighted that his new found talent for photography has changed his life.

Luke, 23, said he spent years drifting from job to job before deciding that he wanted to embark on a career in the media.

He says studying photography gave him a new way of "hearing" the world around him.

After spending two years at Newbury College, he is now on course to start a degree in film media at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth.

He sealed his place with an A grade in GCSE Photography on top of Bs in A-level media studies and a media studies AVCE (Advanced Vocational Certificate in Education).

A skilled lip-reader, Luke's return to study was also aided by the college, which provided trained communicators to help him during lessons.

Determined one day to break into the film world, Luke said studying has helped him hone a sense of how images - both moving and still - can fill the gaps left by the silence around him.

He said: "For me, pictures are a source of information.

"They are how I hear things, they are how I learn because by looking at the pictures I can visualise for myself without having to listen to it.

"With pictures, I can see for myself what is being put across to me, I can see for myself the message that's coming across so strongly. Without that, I think I would be lost."

Now, as well as playing rugby for Reading Abbey RFC and for the Welsh deaf rugby squad, Luke fills his time working with a travelling theatre group and planning for a future in film or television.

Copyright © Trinity Mirror Plc 2005