Office Hours: City College Tuesday 12:00-12:30pm and Friday 12:00-12:30pm or by appointment.
Course Description
Multimedia 1 (Art 39550) is an introductory course on media production and theory with an emphasis on the world wide web. You will learn how to decode, create and critique various media artifacts including audio, video and hypertext. This course has no required texts, although weekly reading assignments will be provided.
Your grade will be based on a combination of in-class participation, weekly reading and blog posts, and projects completed throughout the semester.
Objectives
Get comfortable thinking about and discussing media theory
Become familiar with the technologies used for creating websites
Learn the necessary skills for creating online audio and video
Practice effectively critiquing the work of others and accepting critique
Student Responsibilities
Turn in work on time. Late work will not be accepted without penalty.
Spend an appropriate amount of time working on assignments outside of class. The minimum is 3 hours per class per week.
Be present! Attendance in mandatory. 4 absences = a failing grade.
You are responsible for signing the role. This is how I know that you were present.
Students are required to keep a sketchbook/notebook and take notes on readings, discussions, and lectures.
Method of Evaluation
Participation and Attendance: 30%
Exercises: 30%
Midterm: 20%
Final Project: 20%
Class participation
Time spent in class is structured to include lecture, lab time, discussion and presentations of your work. You will also give one presentation about a media artist. Your participation grade is largely a measure of how involved and prepared you are in class and how effectively you participate.
Assignments + Projects
You will have nine exercises, a mid-term and a final project. Your grades on projects will be determined based on craft and punctuality. Spend the necessary time to learn the skills involved.
Class Etiquette
When I am presenting the class lecture I ask that students refrain from texting, checking their email, etc. I will not do those things when you are speaking and I ask for the same courtesy. This same respect should be extended to your fellow classmates. If someone is being disrespectful during critique they will be asked to leave the classroom and will receive a 0 for the day.
Exercise 1: Use Firebug to explore how a elements of a particular web page work. You will modify a web page of your choice using firebug, and post before and after screen shots of your page to your Wordpress blog.
Install from Firefox with Tools > Add-Ons
Take a screenshot before and after your experiments: cmd-shift-4 on Mac, prnt scrn (or fn-prnt scrn) on Windows
Right-click and choose "Inspect Element" to explore an element Modify attributes, modify CSS attributes, delete elements, whatever you want to try!
If it's not obvious to you how something works, try searching here and here.
Come to class with before and after screenshots and be prepared to share what you learned.
Exercise 2: Working in groups of 4-5, create a hyperlinked nonlinear narrative based on the type of interaction used in On the Night of Mr. Melvyn's Murder. Build this narrative using hypertext links made between your blog for the course. There should be at least one page per group member.
Class 4
Dicussion
View Exercise 3
Discuss reading
Listen to and discuss examples of "classic" and contemporary musique concrete.
Exercise 3:
Using google maps, make a personalized map of your favorite places in the city. Think about the places you would want to discover if you were new to the city, or the places you might visit one last time if you were moving away. Include at least 3 locations. Embed your map on your page on your blog for the course. Associate each location with at least one image and some text (hyperlinked text, if you're feeling ambitious!) about why this place interests you.
Exercise 4:
Create four audio pieces 1 minute in duration.
Class 6
Discussion
Listen to and discuss examples of field recording by Glenn Gould, Chris Watson, etc.
Workshop
TBD
Listening: Listen to this piece by Studs Terkel on Fresh Air.
Exercise 5: Working in pairs, choose one location included in either person's "Mapping My City" project. Visit that location with a video camera and find two people to interview about the place. Do the interviews with your lens covered, recording only audio. What you ask is up to you - you might find a tourist visiting the Empire State Building to talk to about their experience, or ask the waitress behind the counter at your favorite restaurant about her impressions of NYC. Between the two team members, you should collectively get the following material:
5 minutes of interview conducted by team member 1
5 minutes of interview conducted by team member 2
5 minutes of field recording (ambient sounds)
1 minute of spoken introduction by team member 1
1 minute of spoken introduction by team member 2
The interview sound material will be shared while the introductions will be specific for each project. Before next class import the audio into audacity and try improve the quality of the interview using filters (compressor, noise removal, equalization, normalizer etc).
Class 7
Workshop
Work on Midterm
Work on Midterm
Class 8
Discussion
Midterm Critique
Midterm:
For the Midterm you should create a soundscape 4 - 5 minutes long. Try to describe an environment either imagined or real with sound.
Experiment with the locations of sounds in space, the morphology of sounds (how they change), the dynamics (loud/soft), and so on.
Consider: What kind of space are you attempting to convey? How small/large is it? Are the sounds primarly "natural" or man-made?
Class 9
Discussion
Discuss reading
View and discuss The Man With the Movie Camera by Dziga Vertov
Exercise 6: Write a 2 page analysis of The Work of Art. Consider the revelance of Benjamin's
writing today. What insights are useful for understanding "digital" art? What does Benjamin
mean by the aura of an artwork? According to Benjamin, what are the ways in which film differs from previous art forms?
Class 10
Workshop
Final Cut Session 2
Work on Exercise 7
Exercise 7: Shoot and bring to class all the footage and material for exercise 8.
Class 11
Discussion
View and discuss exercise 8
Exercise 8: Create short montage in the spirit of Vertov's Man with a Movie Camera. Each of you will be assigned one track from the Cinematic Orchestra soundtrack that will serve as your soundtrack for this assignment. Head out into the city and try to approach what you find there the way Vertov did in Man with a Movie Camera. This can be literal or abstract- you might try to mimic specific shots that struck you, or just try to capture the zeitgeist of your city in 2010. Whatever you decide to do, remember to experiment — this is your opportunity try a range of styles and techniques. Try out different camera angles and shots, lighting conditions, subjects in motion, camera in motion, both!
Class 12
Discussion
View and discuss Exercise 9
View and discuss examples of video art
Exercise 9: Create a video using a piece of appropriated footage.
Class 13
Discussion
TBD
Proposal for Final due.
Class 14
Workshop
Work on Final
Work on Final
Class 15
Discussion
Final Critique
Final Project
As promised, a screencast demonstrating exporting video for web in Final Cut: