Massachusetts College of Art
SIM 4XX - Interactive Multimedia
Fall 2002

Syllabus

Fridays, 9 - 1:30 p.m.
Room 729, Tower Building

Prof: Nita Sturiale
Email:nsturiale@massart.edu
Office hours: Wed 1:30-3:00 and Thur 12:30-2

Technical Assistant: Corey Smithson
Email: coreysmithson@hotmail.com
Office hours: by apt.

~ To weekly schedule ~

Course Description

This course is a collaborative exploration of the artistic potentials of digital media tools with an emphasis on the conceptual processes necessary to create Interactive Mulitmedia projects. Students will refine their artistic voice while acquiring technical skills as they produce artworks with digital multimedia authoring tools. Students will learn the basics of interactivity using Macromedia Director and Flash, CDRom production, as well as how to prepare interactive multimedia content for the web. The course will also introduce basic digital video issues. Historical perspectives, a survey of artists works, and future trends will also be presented throughout the course. This course attempts to demystify the overwhelming complexity of current digital interactive production tools as well as provide practice in navigating within this continuously changing field.

This class is designed to provide you with an opportunity to immerse yourself in these tools - in all their complexity - as you use them for making your art.

• Campus Network
• Redefinition of Interactive Multimedia - Slide Show > Virtual Reality
• Project Proposal Writing
• Script Writing for Interactive projects
• Storyboards and Click-throughs
• Image Editing, Compression and Resolution Review
• Overview of Macromedia Director
• Overview of Macromedia Flash and Vector graphics
• Multimedia for the web (Bandwidth, resolution and experience)
• Audio/Video Production Workshop
• Digital Sound/Video Editing
• Basics of Lingo scripting - Director
• Basics Action scripting - Flash
• CDROM Production
• Overview steps to developing an interactive multimedia project

Course Requirements

We'll be together 4 + hours per week for 3 + months. Our goal is to learn things we don't already know towards the long-term goal of being effective and articulate artists. A teacher's responsibility is to present information, provocations and a structured environment that will help you learn. Your responsibility is to fully participate in this environment by voicing your interests, thoughts, and questions, as well as listening to your classmates. Class participation, discussion and attention is fundamental and required.

Artists express ideas, information, opinions, questions, thoughts, dreams, aesthetic sensibilities, etc. Digital media provides opportunities to express in faster, wider, more complex, and, just plain different ways. Learning how to use these tools is just as challenging as learning how to throw a clay pot without it collapsing or calculating the math involved in architectural drafting. It takes patience, a sense of humor and a willingness to try new things without fear. In most cases, you won't break the computer unless you throw it out a window (which you may want to do at times).

Also required is that you apply for, and use, an email account and that you become practiced at working online. Much of the course materials are online via the following URL - http://babel.massart.edu/~nita. The syllabus for this course is linked from this page and from there you'll find other specific links to course materials. Additionally you'll need to apply for MassArt Web Server Space with Fred WolfLink <fredless@massart.edu>

Finally, please purchase a "how to" book for Director and Flash. If you are starting out, I highly recommend the Visual QuickStart Guides by PeachPit Press.

List of requirements and assignments:

• Get an email account. Let us know if you need help with this.

• Be present in body - come to class ontime - more than two absences and/or chronic lateness will result in a NC grade,

• Be present in mind and mouth - participate in class discussion and critique sessions,

• Participate in classtime workshops,

• Read the readings and be prepared to discuss them in class,

• Complete Assignments:

  1. Apply for MassArt Web Server Space with Fred WolfLink <fredless@massart.edu>
  2. Bring 6 digital images representing your art ideas in digital slide show format.
  3. Pencil sketch digital click-through of Interactive Artwork
  4. Interactive Artwork Proposal
  5. Interactive Artwork Proposal Revision
  6. Present Interactive Artwork Prototype in progress
  7. Mid semester self-evaluation
     (print from http://babel.massart.edu/~nita/fall2002/eval/mideval.html)
  8. Final self-evaluation
     (print from http://babel.massart.edu/~nita/fall2002/eval/finaleval.html)
  9. Present Final Interactive Artwork Prototype

Reading Selections

1. Burgy, Donald. "Information", 1989.
2. Burgy, Donald. "To be an Artist...". Undated.
3. Couch, John S. "The Artist of the Future Is a Technologist", May 1997.
4. Johnson, Steven. Interface Culture, Harper, 1997.
5. Laurel, Brenda. Computer as Theater, Addison-Wesley Pub Co.
6. Mirapaul, Matthew. "New Public Art Uses the Internet for a Personal Touch", New York Times, August 5, 2002.
7. Norman, Donald. "Emotion and Design", jnd.org, July 2002.
8. Riding, Chris. "Drowning By Microgallery", Resisting the Virtual Life, edited by James Brook and Iain Boal, City Lights, 1995. pg. 246 -251.
9. Stilgoe, John R. Outside Lies Magic, Walker and Company, pgs. 1- 19, 1998.

Stimuli - http://babel.massart.edu/~nita/fall2002/stimuli.html

Resources - http://babel.massart.edu/~nita/fall2002/resources.html