Film, Video, New Media, and Animation: Courses

This seminar is designed to introduce the student to the language of the moving image, its history and the ways in which artists have used moving images in this century. The course will explore the idea of radical contecnt and experimental form by establishing the normative models and procedures of cinema and video, and then showing the ways artists have challenged these conventions. The course will define and differentiate the two dominant forms of mocing image: film and video, and begin a consideration of new and expanding forms for the moving image. The course is a prerequesite to both Film I and Video I and intends to introduce the student to the moving image through a series of group excercises.

This seminar is designed to introduce the student to the language of the moving image, its history and the ways in which artists have used moving images in this century. The course will explore the idea of radical contecnt and experimental form by establishing the normative models and procedures of cinema and video, and then showing the ways artists have challenged these conventions. The course will define and differentiate the two dominant forms of mocing image: film and video, and begin a consideration of new and expanding forms for the moving image. The course is a prerequesite to both Film I and Video I and intends to introduce the student to the moving image through a series of group excercises.

This course introduces video as a medium for artistic expression and social inquiry. Students gain an understanding of the video image-making process and develop proficiency with video equipment, including portable and studio production and editing systems. Strategies for the use of video as an art-making tool are explored. Works by video artists are viewed and discussed.

This course introduces video as a medium for artistic expression and social inquiry. Students gain an understanding of the video image-making process and develop proficiency with video equipment, including portable and studio production and editing systems. Strategies for the use of video as an art-making tool are explored. Works by video artists are viewed and discussed.

Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a rigorous investigation of the art of film editing and should provide a historical and theorectial understanding of film editing based on the study of past works. Close reading of films will train the student in the core aesthetic decisions, structures, strategies and demands of editing. This will involve not only screening works but also analyzing these works through shot by shot contemplation of selected scenes. In addition, we will be reading several classic theroretical texts and will involve ourselves with discussion of these texts in relation to the works whown in class. Students should be taking Film 1 Film as Capture simultaneously with this class Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a theoretically based course and is not designed to offer critique for works-in-progress. Instead, each student will be using ideas learned from this class along with the material shot in Film 1 :Film as Capture to prepare for next semester when students will take shot material into the Editing Practicum Class to actually finish a project.

Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a rigorous investigation of the art of film editing and should provide a historical and theorectial understanding of film editing based on the study of past works. Close reading of films will train the student in the core aesthetic decisions, structures, strategies and demands of editing. This will involve not only screening works but also analyzing these works through shot by shot contemplation of selected scenes. In addition, we will be reading several classic theroretical texts and will involve ourselves with discussion of these texts in relation to the works whown in class. Students should be taking Film 1 Film as Capture simultaneously with this class Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a theoretically based course and is not designed to offer critique for works-in-progress. Instead, each student will be using ideas learned from this class along with the material shot in Film 1 :Film as Capture to prepare for next semester when students will take shot material into the Editing Practicum Class to actually finish a project.

Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a rigorous investigation of the art of film editing and should provide a historical and theorectial understanding of film editing based on the study of past works. Close reading of films will train the student in the core aesthetic decisions, structures, strategies and demands of editing. This will involve not only screening works but also analyzing these works through shot by shot contemplation of selected scenes. In addition, we will be reading several classic theroretical texts and will involve ourselves with discussion of these texts in relation to the works whown in class. Students should be taking Film 1 Film as Capture simultaneously with this class Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a theoretically based course and is not designed to offer critique for works-in-progress. Instead, each student will be using ideas learned from this class along with the material shot in Film 1 :Film as Capture to prepare for next semester when students will take shot material into the Editing Practicum Class to actually finish a project.

This class is essentially an intense cinematography class exclusively given over to beginning 16mm film production. All shooting is done on film. Camerea, lighting, mise-en-scene, camera language, figure placement, film- stocks, and exposure reading are a few of the areas that will be of special concern. We will not be dealing with sound or with editing; those are areas of study that have their own classes, and those important areas of the filmic process will be covered with the kind of attention they deserve in those courses. Of course, we will come to appreciate, through studying finished films, how to anticipate and prepare our ideas for editing and sound in the way we construct and handle the shooting of the work. Students at this level will be exposed to potential finishing paths that will impact editing and completion issues. Students will be required to participate in several in-class assignments. In addition, each student will undertake the shooting of a personal project to be critiqued at the end of the term.

This class builds on the skill set of Film 1: Film as Capture and Editing Strategies/Critical Histories. As in Film 1: Film as Capture, all shooting is done on 16mm film utilizing classic film set-ups and strategies. The sync sound shoot will be a guiding topic of the course but many other production strategies and technical topics will be covered as well. Advanced sound sync cameras, advanced lighting, basic field and sync recording are covered in this class. Students are taught sound syncing using Fianl Cut Pro and will be encouraged to finish their personal project on DV. The class is very hands-on, requiring both in-class and personal projects. This is an ideal class to roundout cinematic skills and allow the first steps into digital interface.

Editing Practicum is an intermediate level post-production seminar designed for students working in film and video. Conducted as a workshop in which students present unfinished work for critique and as the basis for demonstrations, this course provides methods for the organization and structuring of material in both short and long-form work. While concentrating on practical problem solving, particular attention is paid to sound/image relationships, structural continuity/discontinuity, professional practices and non-traditional working methods. Students are expected to enroll with a work-in-progress and to finish with a lock-cut of their film or video project. If time permits close analysis of films and videos and outside readings may be included.

This class is inspired by Johannes Itten?s radical early twentieth-century basic art course developed for the Weimar Bauhaus School of Art, but here using the Maya 3D software, typically used for commercial productions by the entertainment industry. Students will solve a series of formal problems, introduced in increasing levels of complexity. Moving from the 2-dimensional to the 3-dimensional and ultimately to the four-dimensional or time-based, students will evolve their abilities to utilize aspects of light and dark, form, rhythm, color, proportion and volume but in terms of a post photographic discourse, with the intention of advancing a new virtual cinema.

This class is inspired by Johannes Itten?s radical early twentieth-century basic art course developed for the Weimar Bauhaus School of Art, but here using the Maya 3D software, typically used for commercial productions by the entertainment industry. Students will solve a series of formal problems, introduced in increasing levels of complexity. Moving from the 2-dimensional to the 3-dimensional and ultimately to the four-dimensional or time-based, students will evolve their abilities to utilize aspects of light and dark, form, rhythm, color, proportion and volume but in terms of a post photographic discourse, with the intention of advancing a new virtual cinema.

This introductory course focuses on screen-based new media works, their historical contexts, their specific aesthetics and theoretical concerns. Students gain an understanding of the emerging culture and historical antecedents of new media. Interactive, network and web-based technologies are introduced from the perspective of media art making. New media works are screened, discussed and demonstrated.

Systems, Codes & Spaces critically introduces the art of nonlinear media art via an understanding of its historical and theoretical trajectories. Students view and analyze structurally a variety of works in the mediums of video, installation, interactive media, new media and experimental 3D. Readings drawn from Jack Burnham, Pamela Lee, and Edward Shanken are discussed to assess the contemporary state of the field. Students must enroll in FVNM 2100 New Media: Crash Course simultaneously as a corequisite.

This class introduces the traditional animation techniques of creating movement through successive drawings. Techniques include metamorphosis, walking cycles, holds, squash and stretch, blur and resistance. Students use the pencil test Lunch-Box to view their work . Students complete a series of exercises encouraging a full range of animation skills and a final project. Films illustrating drawn-animation techniques are screened regularly.

This class introduces the traditional animation techniques of creating movement through successive drawings. Techniques include metamorphosis, walking cycles, holds, squash and stretch, blur and resistance. Students use the pencil test Lunch-Box to view their work . Students complete a series of exercises encouraging a full range of animation skills and a final project. Films illustrating drawn-animation techniques are screened regularly.

What are the concerns that drive one's creative practice? How does one set the terms for its future development? This course offers strategies for the evaluation and communication of students' individual practice as artists, designers and/or scholars. Through essential readings, studio projects, and writing, students will generate narratives about how and why they make art. To do so, they will investigate methods (visual, critical, written, and creative) for the reconsideration of their work and of its aims and priorities. Individual mentoring with the faculty member is a central and dedicated component of the class as a means of fostering the self-identification of goals and priorities. Students will also examine historical and contemporary precedents that relate to their own work in order to consider the ways in which their individual explorations can be brought into dialogue with other perspectives. Students participate in broad ranging discussions about the present status and future prospects of art and design through workshops, dialogues, and collaborations both in the class and in SAIC-wide conversations with other Sophomore Studio Seminars. An important function of this course is to build upon these insights in forming a practical plan that helps students effectively map the curriculum and resources of SAIC into their own needs. For more information see http://blogs.saic.edu/sophseminar/

What are the concerns that drive one's creative practice? How does one set the terms for its future development? This course offers strategies for the evaluation and communication of students' individual practice as artists, designers and/or scholars. Through essential readings, studio projects, and writing, students will generate narratives about how and why they make art. To do so, they will investigate methods (visual, critical, written, and creative) for the reconsideration of their work and of its aims and priorities. Individual mentoring with the faculty member is a central and dedicated component of the class as a means of fostering the self-identification of goals and priorities. Students will also examine historical and contemporary precedents that relate to their own work in order to consider the ways in which their individual explorations can be brought into dialogue with other perspectives. Students participate in broad ranging discussions about the present status and future prospects of art and design through workshops, dialogues, and collaborations both in the class and in SAIC-wide conversations with other Sophomore Studio Seminars. An important function of this course is to build upon these insights in forming a practical plan that helps students effectively map the curriculum and resources of SAIC into their own needs. For more information see http://blogs.saic.edu/sophseminar/

This course deals with technical and aesthetic issues concerning soundtrack composition and its relationship to visual concerns in cinematic works. Technical aspects are covered by thorough instruction in the use of Pro Tools for audio post-production, including its coordination with Final Cut Pro and OMF files; editing, mixing, and mastering; synchronization to image; and final output to video and film. Aesthetic and conceptual issues pertaining to sound-image relationships and strategies are covered by analyzing examples from cinematic practice and through readings, including writings by Michel Chion, Abigail Child, Rick Altman, Walter Murch, and others; and cinematic works by Abigail Child, Walter Verdun, Martin Scorsese, Gary Hill, and others.

Appropriating standardized digital bodies, students learn the basics of character animation to choreograph virtual performances using Maya, the 3D animation software. The class explores the virtual performance in terms of the visual possibilities of cinematic language and also to exploit the potential of digital bodies to move in both natural and unnatural ways, beyond imitating of reality. References include avant-garde dance and performance films, from Maya Deren to Yvonne Rainer and Charles Atlas.

Using Maya, the 3D animation software, students create simulated site-specific installations using simulated objects. The techniques of cinematic special-effects are employed to create virtual assemblages for real sites. The course strategy combines and manipulates appropriated 3D models, to be digitally placed into photos of Chicago or other sites. Technical focus is be on match lighting, using Maya's global illumination and Photoshop, for seamless integration. Significant class time is spent viewing the work of contemporary installation artists from Gordon Matta-Clark and James Turrell to Krzysztof Wodiczko.

This course introduces students to the basic elements of a screenplay, including format, terminology, exposition, characterization, dialogue, voice-over, adaptation, and variations on the three-act structure. Weekly meetings feature a brief lecture, screenings of scenes from films, extended discussion, and assorted readings of class assignments. This is primarily a writing class, with students required to write a four-to-five page weekly assignment related to the script topic of the week.

This course introduces students to the basic elements of a screenplay, including format, terminology, exposition, characterization, dialogue, voice-over, adaptation, and variations on the three-act structure. Weekly meetings feature a brief lecture, screenings of scenes from films, extended discussion, and assorted readings of class assignments. This is primarily a writing class, with students required to write a four-to-five page weekly assignment related to the script topic of the week.

An interdisciplinary studio that develops skills specific to the challenges of writing for time-based projects, especially works in film, video, installation, and performance. The primary focus is in-class writing, a range of textual experiments, and workshop /critique of students' writing in relation to their own works-in-progress. We pay attention to 'invisible' texts--the writing before the script, free-writing, conceptual issues--as well as overt ones. Special emphasis is placed on developing the ear in work on monologue, dialogue, and voice-over. The class reads and discusses selected scripts and writings by artists, screens films and videos, attends exhibitions and performances, and performs close analyses (another form of 'reading') of texts.

This course is a production class designed for students interested in alternative modes of narrative production in film and Video. Through workshops on writing, acting, and directing, students learn to work with actors, dialogue, and alternative narrative structures. Students apply the concepts covered in class to their selected projects, from production through editing. Throughout the course, a wide range of narrative films utilizing experimental modes of production are screened. Technical issues are covered in cinematography workshops, but it is assumed that students have a solid technical grounding in their medium of choice. Though the body of this class focuses on film and video production, the class is also appropriate for students working in performance and sound.

This course is a sequel to the Image Making class (FVNM 3027) and is designed to further enhance and develop techniques learned in that course. Students will make use of the Oxberry optical printer; learn contact printing, emulsion manipulation, direct animation and some digital image processing. The course will be focusing on artistic application of these techniques, as well as methods used in the introductory course, towards a finished project. A short film is required for successful completion of the course.

This is an intensive studio course for advanced students of film/video to explore the creative uses of light in their projects. Through the examination of cinematographic approaches across the various genres including narrative, experimental, and documentary, students apply advanced techniques of lighting and composition to their work. Emphasis is placed on the changing role of the cinematographer in the world of digital media.

This course is an introduction to the concepts and processes utilized in the production of artworks with digital animation tools. A variety of techniques are explored for modeling, surface description, image mapping, lighting simulation, computer graphics in desktop video, installation, and print forms. This is a prerequisite for advanced computer animation.

This course gives students the opportunity to comprehensively explore industry-standard devices in digital editing and visual effects, bringing to bear the power and versatility of nonlinear editing on their creative projects. The class offers advanced editing techniques including data management, sound mixing, visual effects, color correction, compression scheme and outputting options.

Intermediate Screenwriting expands upon the skills learned and spript work accomplished in Beginning Screenwriting, while preparing certain students for the longer-form writing required in Advanced Screenwriting. Students are expected to complete 2 to 3 drafts of a 30 page original script, which will be read, workshop-style, during the class. There are occasional lectures and screenings to help address writing problems that might arise during the composing and drafting process.

This production course explores the history, theory, aesthetics, and culture of 8mm and Super 8 filmmaking. Students produce moving images on Super 8 film, and experiment with various sound sources. Screenings of work by Super 8 filmmakers such as Jem Cohen, Bruce LaBruce, Thomas Allan Harris, Rebecca Devlin, and many others, provide insight into the complexities of production in this medium. Students receive thorough technical instruction to familiarize them with the workings of the Super 8 camera, film stocks, light, sound, and processing labs. Students transfer film to Mini-DV and projects, edit on Final Cut Pro or Avid Xpress DV, and exhibit final projects on DVD or Super 8 film.

Small-scale screening spaces or 'microcinemas' have seen renewed vitality in recent years as sites for exploring new models of moving-image exhibition. A hybrid studies/practicum course, FVNM 3222 examines the microcinema critically, historically and practically. We look at contemporary and historical examples -- French cine-clubs in the 1920s, revolutionary underground screenings in 1960s Argentina, post-colonial mobile cinemas throughout Africa, as well as US film societies from 1940s to today. Students also connect with contemporary microcinemas around the US and organize all aspects of a public microcinema event in the Chicago area -- booking venues, curating work, and generating press.

This Class introduces students to the design, construction, and filming of 3D-puppet animation. Students build puppets, construct sets, and film their work either digitally, or on 16mm film. Students learn to build armatures and puppets, practice pose-to-pose movement, replacement animation, and work on set design. In the second half of semester, students present storyboards for a final project that involves sets, puppets, and shooting two minutes of frame by frame animation. During this time framing, micro-cinematography, and camera movement are covered. Sound is optional.

This course introduces methods of animating to a soundtrack and the relationship between dialogue, voiceover, sound and image. Animating to logged audio, students learn the most normative pipeline for creating animated images. Advanced camera movements and digital 2-D animation with backgrounds are also covered. Students complete weekly assignments that build toward a final project, an animation with sync sound.

This course addresses various animation techniques and materials, analogue and digital. Students work with different drawing materials, cut-outs, cameraless animation, under the camera destructive and constructive animation, and compositing images in Flash and Photoshop. Expanding on skills developed in Animation I, students create more painterly and material looking work.

Students further develop 2-D drawing animation skills, with focus on complex movement, animating dialogue, and drawing with backgrounds. Drawings on paper are scanned into Toon-Boom Studio for digital cell production. Time is spent on creating backgrounds and camera moves in the program. Some Knowledge of Final-Cut Pro, After Effects or Flash is recommended.

This course considers the use of film as it pertains to the recording of events and the documentation of phenomena. Forms are studied that relate to these uses and cover various aspects of film production. The instructor works with students individually when possible.

Multi-monitor projects, live feeds, interactive environments, political interventions, meditative spaces: video installation offers artists a rich and multi-layered vocabulary with which to address a host of issues in contemporary culture. In public life, video is 'installed' everywhere as a permanent fixture - in the high-tech spectacle of Nike-town and the surveillance and security systems of parking garages, shopping malls, and prisons. This class combines studio practice, site visits, screenings, readings, and critiques of student work to examine the diverse languages and practices of video within an installation context. Students experiment with monitors, projectors, and other media while addressing concerns of site and scale, issues of narrative, identity, reception and audience, and private/public space. Students who enroll in this class should already have basic knowledge of video production; however students with backgrounds in all media?video, film, sculpture, painting, or photography?are encouraged to enroll.

This course is for students who have a sustained interest in using video technology as part of their art making. Participants work on a project-oriented basis that include individual critiques, special class meetings, practicums, and equipment workshops. Students should be both self-directed and interested in developing a support system for producing each other's work. This course will be offered on a semester-to-semester basis, but students who wish access to the video department during the winter interim must take both semesters.

Students complete the first draft of a feature-length screenplay (at least 90 pages) based on an original idea that they propose and develop in the first or second class. No adaptations or partially-completed scripts are allowed. Weekly class sessions include group reading of script pages and critique by classmates and instructor.

This advanced seminar and production studio aims to examine the politics of tourism and the artistic methodologies available for engaging critically with the discourse surrounding the tourist, and its transformed objects: the city, the street, the ruin, the native inhabitant, etc. Our research will be guided by questions such as: Can we look at traveling itineraries as an art form, as a form of knowledge and experience? How do we 'perform the city'? How do we walk in the city? How do our actions transform the city, and how do we relate our creative processes to tourism, and the relatively new subjectivity of the tourist. How do we mediate the city through our performances? Is our gaze different from the gaze of the tourist? The course is designed for both advanced undergraduates and graduates interested in developing their own projects. Students create performances based on their interests and in response to trips in the Chicago area at different location (touristic attractions, as well as 'ruins', old theaters, the remains of White City, Gary Indiana, etc.)

The class is designed as an advanced independent project for students who have taken both Image Making and Advanced Photographic and Optical Processes (FVNM 3027 and 3037) to further enhance and develop their work involving motion picture optical processing mechanisms. Students work on their existing projects and are required to finish or produce images on 16mm film. Instruction and weekly meetings are held throughout the semester. All students are given access to JK Optical Printer, Oxberry Optical Printer and Contact Printer Model C and other production tools and machines. Some outside work is also required. Additionally, a final project presentation is due at the end of the semester.

This is a production class that will focus on idea development for time based media, through the use of storyboards, treatments, location photos, sketchbooks, and script readings. Students working in film, video, performance, and animation will learn classical and experimental ways to negotiate these thechniques as an integral part of the production of time based works. The final project for this class will be a loose-leaf volume containing treatment, storyboards and research scrapbook for a major work. This volume will be used for idea develpment and presentation of your project to collaborators, granting agencies, fellowship organizations and most importantly you, the maker.

This course focuses on the nexus of issues associated with the increasing presence of moving-image media within contemporary art and the challenges that such works pose for scholars and critics, curators and programmers, preparators and conservators. Part moving-image media history, part museological preservation practicum, the course will chronicle the emergence of film, video, and net art, the strategies used by artists and curators to shift work from the black box of the theater into the white cube of the gallery, and the problems posed by the use of consumer-grade media in the fabrication of works of art. Specific case studies will range from an examination of ongoing archival projects within the avant-garde cinema to attempts to salvage content from Portapac-era productions and contemporary efforts at migrating earlier forms of interactive media onto new platforms and equipment.

An investigation of media and cinematic representations of 'terrorism' through the 20th century up to the present. Primary 'texts' will be films, videos, and photography, supported by readings from a wide range of sources: historical, political economy, fiction, media criticism, oral histories. Students will screen and study propaganda films, narratives, film and video essays, and experimental works whose subject directly or obliquely addresses the subject of political violence. The course will examine the moblizing effects of these works, and seek to unpack a hefty suitcase of current debates about moral relativism, just and unjust wars, the problem of evil, and uses of violence in film.

This class is for students who have explored various animation techiques and wish to create a finished work. All animation techniques (drawing, puppets, cut-outs, CG, etc.) are welcome. Students work in an environment of highly motivated, like minded individuals, and receive regular critiques of their work-in-progress.

The course aims to analyze and confront in practice the characteristics of non-linear and interactive narrative, by resorting to models taken from traditional media (literature, video/film, architecture, installation and game playing) as well as from contemporary digital and on line work. Throughout the course we explore the various principles underlying non linear work, such as excess, fragmentation, multiplicity of points of view, erasure, interruption, dialogical constructions. Viewings, readings and critiqued exercises supply means for students to examine issues of navigation in time and space, the placement and role of the user, interactive and collaborative authoring, open and closed compositions.

Art Games considers computer based games as New Media artworks and art as a game-like system. Computer-based games constitute a significant form of new screen media and cultural activity. Artists work with game-like structures and approaches to create New Media projects. Students will play, discuss and develop art games that share relationships to forms of gameplay from text-based adventure games to first-person shooters, strategy games and simulators to conceptual games of chance. This advanced level studio course enables students to hack, modify, and critique existing games, and independently author games as New Media artworks.

Motion graphics-compositing-visual effects are highly involved and multi-faceted. Students deepen and expand what they have learned in Motion Graphics and Visual Effects 1. More involved and advanced techniques are covered, such as working in space with lights and cameras, and integrating effects with 3D software applications. Motion tracking and image stabilization, advanced rotoscoping and painting techniques, audio for image manipulation, and issues in working with film are covered. Students pursue solutions to visual problems that would be encountered in the professional post-production world.

This class is inspired by Johannes Itten's radical early twentieth-century basic art course developed for the Weimar Bauhaus School of Art, but here using the Maya 3D software, typically used for commercial productions by the entertainment industry. Students will solve a series of formal problems, introduced in increasing levels of complexity. Moving from the 2-dimensional to the 3-dimensional and ultimately to the four-dimensional or time-based, students will evolve their abilities to utilize aspects of light and dark, form, rhythm, color, proportion and volume but in terms of a post photographic discourse, with the intention of advancing a new virtual cinema.

This course deals with technical and aesthetic issues concerning soundtrack composition and its relationship to visual concerns in cinematic works. Technical aspects are covered by thorough instruction in the use of Pro Tools for audio post-production, including its coordination with Final Cut Pro and OMF files; editing, mixing, and mastering; synchronization to image; and final output to video and film. Aesthetic and conceptual issues pertaining to sound-image relationships and strategies are covered by analyzing examples from cinematic practice and through readings, including writings by Michel Chion, Abigail Child, Rick Altman, Walter Murch, and others; and cinematic works by Abigail Child, Walter Verdun, Martin Scorsese, Gary Hill, and others.

This course is designed to teach students the specific skills required to find an adaptable story, pick it apart, and piece it back together as a solid screenplay. The class reads various stories, views the films made from them, and argues the success and/or failure of each adaptation. They then apply what they have learned to write the first draft of their own 30-page script, based on a short story that is the same for each student.

Since the early 1960s, when cheaper and more portable film tools became available, the non-fiction moving image has expanded beyond its early forms of documentation, observation, and actuality, to include essays, visual anthropology, compilation, re-enactment, and docudrama. This class will look at the historical expansion of the non-fiction moving image in the context of current practices and their possible futures, concentrating on works produced internationally from the last two decades.

This seminar is designed to introduce the student to the language of the moving image, its history and the ways in which artists have used moving images in this century. The course will explore the idea of radical contecnt and experimental form by establishing the normative models and procedures of cinema and video, and then showing the ways artists have challenged these conventions. The course will define and differentiate the two dominant forms of mocing image: film and video, and begin a consideration of new and expanding forms for the moving image. The course is a prerequesite to both Film I and Video I and intends to introduce the student to the moving image through a series of group excercises.

This seminar is designed to introduce the student to the language of the moving image, its history and the ways in which artists have used moving images in this century. The course will explore the idea of radical contecnt and experimental form by establishing the normative models and procedures of cinema and video, and then showing the ways artists have challenged these conventions. The course will define and differentiate the two dominant forms of mocing image: film and video, and begin a consideration of new and expanding forms for the moving image. The course is a prerequesite to both Film I and Video I and intends to introduce the student to the moving image through a series of group excercises.

This seminar is designed to introduce the student to the language of the moving image, its history and the ways in which artists have used moving images in this century. The course will explore the idea of radical contecnt and experimental form by establishing the normative models and procedures of cinema and video, and then showing the ways artists have challenged these conventions. The course will define and differentiate the two dominant forms of mocing image: film and video, and begin a consideration of new and expanding forms for the moving image. The course is a prerequesite to both Film I and Video I and intends to introduce the student to the moving image through a series of group excercises.

This seminar is designed to introduce the student to the language of the moving image, its history and the ways in which artists have used moving images in this century. The course will explore the idea of radical contecnt and experimental form by establishing the normative models and procedures of cinema and video, and then showing the ways artists have challenged these conventions. The course will define and differentiate the two dominant forms of mocing image: film and video, and begin a consideration of new and expanding forms for the moving image. The course is a prerequesite to both Film I and Video I and intends to introduce the student to the moving image through a series of group excercises.

This seminar is designed to introduce the student to the language of the moving image, its history and the ways in which artists have used moving images in this century. The course will explore the idea of radical contecnt and experimental form by establishing the normative models and procedures of cinema and video, and then showing the ways artists have challenged these conventions. The course will define and differentiate the two dominant forms of mocing image: film and video, and begin a consideration of new and expanding forms for the moving image. The course is a prerequesite to both Film I and Video I and intends to introduce the student to the moving image through a series of group excercises.

This course introduces video as a medium for artistic expression and social inquiry. Students gain an understanding of the video image-making process and develop proficiency with video equipment, including portable and studio production and editing systems. Strategies for the use of video as an art-making tool are explored. Works by video artists are viewed and discussed.

Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a rigorous investigation of the art of film editing and should provide a historical and theorectial understanding of film editing based on the study of past works. Close reading of films will train the student in the core aesthetic decisions, structures, strategies and demands of editing. This will involve not only screening works but also analyzing these works through shot by shot contemplation of selected scenes. In addition, we will be reading several classic theroretical texts and will involve ourselves with discussion of these texts in relation to the works whown in class. Students should be taking Film 1 Film as Capture simultaneously with this class Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a theoretically based course and is not designed to offer critique for works-in-progress. Instead, each student will be using ideas learned from this class along with the material shot in Film 1 :Film as Capture to prepare for next semester when students will take shot material into the Editing Practicum Class to actually finish a project.

Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a rigorous investigation of the art of film editing and should provide a historical and theorectial understanding of film editing based on the study of past works. Close reading of films will train the student in the core aesthetic decisions, structures, strategies and demands of editing. This will involve not only screening works but also analyzing these works through shot by shot contemplation of selected scenes. In addition, we will be reading several classic theroretical texts and will involve ourselves with discussion of these texts in relation to the works whown in class. Students should be taking Film 1 Film as Capture simultaneously with this class Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a theoretically based course and is not designed to offer critique for works-in-progress. Instead, each student will be using ideas learned from this class along with the material shot in Film 1 :Film as Capture to prepare for next semester when students will take shot material into the Editing Practicum Class to actually finish a project.

Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a rigorous investigation of the art of film editing and should provide a historical and theorectial understanding of film editing based on the study of past works. Close reading of films will train the student in the core aesthetic decisions, structures, strategies and demands of editing. This will involve not only screening works but also analyzing these works through shot by shot contemplation of selected scenes. In addition, we will be reading several classic theroretical texts and will involve ourselves with discussion of these texts in relation to the works whown in class. Students should be taking Film 1 Film as Capture simultaneously with this class Editing Strategies and Critical Histories is a theoretically based course and is not designed to offer critique for works-in-progress. Instead, each student will be using ideas learned from this class along with the material shot in Film 1 :Film as Capture to prepare for next semester when students will take shot material into the Editing Practicum Class to actually finish a project.

This class is essentially an intense cinematography class exclusively given over to beginning 16mm film production. All shooting is done on film. Camerea, lighting, mise-en-scene, camera language, figure placement, film- stocks, and exposure reading are a few of the areas that will be of special concern. We will not be dealing with sound or with editing; those are areas of study that have their own classes, and those important areas of the filmic process will be covered with the kind of attention they deserve in those courses. Of course, we will come to appreciate, through studying finished films, how to anticipate and prepare our ideas for editing and sound in the way we construct and handle the shooting of the work. Students at this level will be exposed to potential finishing paths that will impact editing and completion issues. Students will be required to participate in several in-class assignments. In addition, each student will undertake the shooting of a personal project to be critiqued at the end of the term.

This class is essentially an intense cinematography class exclusively given over to beginning 16mm film production. All shooting is done on film. Camerea, lighting, mise-en-scene, camera language, figure placement, film- stocks, and exposure reading are a few of the areas that will be of special concern. We will not be dealing with sound or with editing; those are areas of study that have their own classes, and those important areas of the filmic process will be covered with the kind of attention they deserve in those courses. Of course, we will come to appreciate, through studying finished films, how to anticipate and prepare our ideas for editing and sound in the way we construct and handle the shooting of the work. Students at this level will be exposed to potential finishing paths that will impact editing and completion issues. Students will be required to participate in several in-class assignments. In addition, each student will undertake the shooting of a personal project to be critiqued at the end of the term.

This class is inspired by Johannes Itten?s radical early twentieth-century basic art course developed for the Weimar Bauhaus School of Art, but here using the Maya 3D software, typically used for commercial productions by the entertainment industry. Students will solve a series of formal problems, introduced in increasing levels of complexity. Moving from the 2-dimensional to the 3-dimensional and ultimately to the four-dimensional or time-based, students will evolve their abilities to utilize aspects of light and dark, form, rhythm, color, proportion and volume but in terms of a post photographic discourse, with the intention of advancing a new virtual cinema.

This class is inspired by Johannes Itten?s radical early twentieth-century basic art course developed for the Weimar Bauhaus School of Art, but here using the Maya 3D software, typically used for commercial productions by the entertainment industry. Students will solve a series of formal problems, introduced in increasing levels of complexity. Moving from the 2-dimensional to the 3-dimensional and ultimately to the four-dimensional or time-based, students will evolve their abilities to utilize aspects of light and dark, form, rhythm, color, proportion and volume but in terms of a post photographic discourse, with the intention of advancing a new virtual cinema.

This introductory course focuses on screen-based new media works, their historical contexts, their specific aesthetics and theoretical concerns. Students gain an understanding of the emerging culture and historical antecedents of new media. Interactive, network and web-based technologies are introduced from the perspective of media art making. New media works are screened, discussed and demonstrated.

Systems, Codes & Spaces critically introduces the art of nonlinear media art via an understanding of its historical and theoretical trajectories. Students view and analyze structurally a variety of works in the mediums of video, installation, interactive media, new media and experimental 3D. Readings drawn from Jack Burnham, Pamela Lee, and Edward Shanken are discussed to assess the contemporary state of the field. Students must enroll in FVNM 2100 New Media: Crash Course simultaneously as a corequisite.

This class introduces the traditional animation techniques of creating movement through successive drawings. Techniques include metamorphosis, walking cycles, holds, squash and stretch, blur and resistance. Students use the pencil test Lunch-Box to view their work . Students complete a series of exercises encouraging a full range of animation skills and a final project. Films illustrating drawn-animation techniques are screened regularly.

This class introduces the traditional animation techniques of creating movement through successive drawings. Techniques include metamorphosis, walking cycles, holds, squash and stretch, blur and resistance. Students use the pencil test Lunch-Box to view their work . Students complete a series of exercises encouraging a full range of animation skills and a final project. Films illustrating drawn-animation techniques are screened regularly.

This class introduces the traditional animation techniques of creating movement through successive drawings. Techniques include metamorphosis, walking cycles, holds, squash and stretch, blur and resistance. Students use the pencil test Lunch-Box to view their work . Students complete a series of exercises encouraging a full range of animation skills and a final project. Films illustrating drawn-animation techniques are screened regularly.

This is a Production Laboratory class for students interested in working with the ideas and techniques of directing performers for the camera. We will consider issues of scripting, pre-production, rehearsing, shooting, and editing performances. The course requires active participation in 3 roles -- as a director, performer, and camera operator -- as these constitute the primary collaborative relationships of a director. The main objective of this class is to get students to consider various methods of directing performers that both explore and elaborate on traditional theatrical schools of directing. Through hands-on experience, readings, critique and screenings, students will begin to carve out their own style of working.

This course introduces students to the basic elements of a screenplay, including format, terminology, exposition, characterization, dialogue, voice-over, adaptation, and variations on the three-act structure. Weekly meetings feature a brief lecture, screenings of scenes from films, extended discussion, and assorted readings of class assignments. This is primarily a writing class, with students required to write a four-to-five page weekly assignment related to the script topic of the week.

This course introduces students to the basic elements of a screenplay, including format, terminology, exposition, characterization, dialogue, voice-over, adaptation, and variations on the three-act structure. Weekly meetings feature a brief lecture, screenings of scenes from films, extended discussion, and assorted readings of class assignments. This is primarily a writing class, with students required to write a four-to-five page weekly assignment related to the script topic of the week.

An interdisciplinary studio that develops skills specific to the challenges of writing for time-based projects, especially works in film, video, installation, and performance. The primary focus is in-class writing, a range of textual experiments, and workshop /critique of students' writing in relation to their own works-in-progress. We pay attention to 'invisible' texts--the writing before the script, free-writing, conceptual issues--as well as overt ones. Special emphasis is placed on developing the ear in work on monologue, dialogue, and voice-over. The class reads and discusses selected scripts and writings by artists, screens films and videos, attends exhibitions and performances, and performs close analyses (another form of 'reading') of texts.

Filmmakers often run into a problem of depending too much on equipment. This makes one believe that it is impossible to be creative without elaborate 'tools.' Artists of film can produce images in any circumstance-with or without complicated tools. If a filmmaker understands the process and mechanism of how images can be generated, equipment can be as minimal as one paper clip. This class is designed to introduce a variety of skills and ideas to make images with simple tools. Students are encouraged to make their own equipment to produce their own image effects. The course mainly focuses on reproduction of images without using large equipment. Some of the ideas introduced in this course are making images without camera and/or lenses; animation; pixilation; time exposure; time lapse; images using slides, stills, and newspapers; all phases of in-camera effects; rephotographing frames; printing in camera; optical printing; and contact printing. Prior enrollment in FILM 2003 is recommended.

This course is an introduction to the concepts and processes utilized in the production of artworks with digital animation tools. A variety of techniques are explored for modeling, surface description, image mapping, lighting simulation, computer graphics in desktop video, installation, and print forms. This is a prerequisite for advanced computer animation.

'Reality television,' despite the furor, is not a particularly new idea. Direct precedents for shows like 'Survivor' and 'Big Brother' can be traced back to 1970, to 'An American Family' or its subcultural counterpart, 'The continuing story of Carel and Ferd'. Some of the most powerful and provocative independent film and video being produced today draws on the age-old fascination with the border between 'document' and 'fiction'. The class would provide a context for producing and critiquing student work, and provide a historical/critical grounding in examining work of video and cinema 'verite' as well as 'experimental narrative' and 'new documentary'.

Students learn a wide range of post-production digital techniques for 2D animation, compositing (layering, collaging), and creating visual effects for video productions. Students produce projects that incorporate manipulated still images, animation, desktop video, and audio. Those who are intrigued by this kind of image manipulation will find the capabilities of the software dynamic and inspiring. Screenings and analysis focus on the use of such techniques in the world of video art, television, and film.

This course covers advanced topics within the 3D modeling arena using AliasWavefront Maya. Students learn the differences/advantages/ disadvantages of various modeling techniques, including NURBS, polygon and subdivision surfaces. The class applies skills learned to the development of characters, objects and environments, while addressing the development of both high-detail, high-resolution objects for cinematic output as well as low-polygon count models intended for interactive platforms such as games and VR. Students learn how to prepare models for animation and character setup. Some aspects of texturing as it relates directly to the construction of a model are covered, including advanced UV controls.

This Class introduces students to the design, construction, and filming of 3D-puppet animation. Students build puppets, construct sets, and film their work either digitally, or on 16mm film. Students learn to build armatures and puppets, practice pose-to-pose movement, replacement animation, and work on set design. In the second half of semester, students present storyboards for a final project that involves sets, puppets, and shooting two minutes of frame by frame animation. During this time framing, micro-cinematography, and camera movement are covered. Sound is optional.

This course introduces methods of animating to a soundtrack and the relationship between dialogue, voiceover, sound and image. Animating to logged audio, students learn the most normative pipeline for creating animated images. Advanced camera movements and digital 2-D animation with backgrounds are also covered. Students complete weekly assignments that build toward a final project, an animation with sync sound.

This course addresses various animation techniques and materials, analogue and digital. Students work with different drawing materials, cut-outs, cameraless animation, under the camera destructive and constructive animation, and compositing images in Flash and Photoshop. Expanding on skills developed in Animation I, students create more painterly and material looking work.

Students further develop 2-D drawing animation skills, with focus on complex movement, animating dialogue, and drawing with backgrounds. Drawings on paper are scanned into Toon-Boom Studio for digital cell production. Time is spent on creating backgrounds and camera moves in the program. Some Knowledge of Final-Cut Pro, After Effects or Flash is recommended.

What possibilities do re-enactments offer in revisiting events of the past? How is history transformed or reclaimed in the process of re-enactments? This course actively researches artistic strategies of re-enactment in contemporary media art and performance, investigating the increased interest in this practice and its variable forms. Students produce work based on their interests and in response to assigned readings (Walter Benjamin, Sigmund Freud, Italo Calvino, Inke Arns, Henry Bergson) and works viewed in class. (Jean Rouch, Jeremy Deller,Rod Dickinson, Ant Farm and T.R. Uthco, Pierre Hughe, Zbignew Libera, Omer Fast, Felix Gmelin, Daniela Comani, Artur Zmijewski, Marina Abramovich, etc). Knowledge of video or photography is required. Supplemental technical workshops will be provided if needed.

Multi-monitor projects, live feeds, interactive environments, political interventions, meditative spaces: video installation offers artists a rich and multi-layered vocabulary with which to address a host of issues in contemporary culture. In public life, video is 'installed' everywhere as a permanent fixture - in the high-tech spectacle of Nike-town and the surveillance and security systems of parking garages, shopping malls, and prisons. This class combines studio practice, site visits, screenings, readings, and critiques of student work to examine the diverse languages and practices of video within an installation context. Students experiment with monitors, projectors, and other media while addressing concerns of site and scale, issues of narrative, identity, reception and audience, and private/public space. Students who enroll in this class should already have basic knowledge of video production; however students with backgrounds in all media?video, film, sculpture, painting, or photography?are encouraged to enroll.

Realtime explores audio-visual systems and performances of live experimental new media art. Artists create, control, effect and transform digital media in realtime using systems created by and for artists. Digital and computational systems allow improvisation, live audio-video performance, and synthesis of complex works and projects. Students learn, play and perform with artware, open source tools and systems (PureData, GEMS and dyne:bolic!) and commercially available software (Max/MSP and Jitter). This studio course includes a historical approach to realtime systems, and features use of the Sandin Image Processor, an analog patch programmable computer optimized for video processing from 1971?1973. Current praxis is discussed in relation to the earlier realtime forms from early cinema (such as Oskar Fischinger?s Lumigraph), video (such as the Dan Sandin?s Sandin Image Processor) and New Media.

This course is for students who have a sustained interest in using video technology as part of their art making. Participants work on a project-oriented basis that include individual critiques, special class meetings, practicums, and equipment workshops. Students should be both self-directed and interested in developing a support system for producing each other's work. This course will be offered on a semester-to-semester basis, but students who wish access to the video department during the winter interim must take both semesters.

This course is for students who have a sustained interest in using video technology as part of their art making. Participants work on a project-oriented basis that include individual critiques, special class meetings, practicums, and equipment workshops. Students should be both self-directed and interested in developing a support system for producing each other's work. This course will be offered on a semester-to-semester basis, but students who wish access to the video department during the winter interim must take both semesters.

As computers continue to shape contemporary cultural perception, they provide artists with a never ending pallet of breaks, fixes, fissures, and malfunctions to navigate and with which to interact. Lost Signals: The Glitch, explores media, history, and culture through failures and accidents in the creation or presentation of media art. Digital technology has its own misfires and breakdowns, from scrambled images to computer translations. These new glitches have important historic parallels to bad processing, hairs in the film gate, and video-tube burns. Students develop projects that engage 'the glitch' in creating and/or viewing work in contemporary media culture.

Students complete the first draft of a feature-length screenplay (at least 90 pages) based on an original idea that they propose and develop in the first or second class. No adaptations or partially-completed scripts are allowed. Weekly class sessions include group reading of script pages and critique by classmates and instructor.

This is a production class that will focus on idea development for time based media, through the use of storyboards, treatments, location photos, sketchbooks, and script readings. Students working in film, video, performance, and animation will learn classical and experimental ways to negotiate these thechniques as an integral part of the production of time based works. The final project for this class will be a loose-leaf volume containing treatment, storyboards and research scrapbook for a major work. This volume will be used for idea develpment and presentation of your project to collaborators, granting agencies, fellowship organizations and most importantly you, the maker.

Students dissect, expand, subvert, and critique computer games to develop new hybrid forms of interactive art. Beyond alluring graphics and fast reflexes, computer games often operate as stories, as simulations, or as social events. Screenings and examples in class analyze the language and structure of computer games, and the ways artists can use them to manifest new content. Technical workshops introduce methods of hacking games, building interactive artworks with game engines, and deploying them on both PCs and virtual reality environments.

Recent developments in many disciplines, from brain science to cultural studies--what has been called the 'affective turn' -- are exerting an enormous influence in how we make theory, make art, and think about 'feelings.' In film theory, much has been written about the 'construct' of real time. This course uses both these lenses to critically investigate an eclectic group of film and video works, primarily from the 1960s and 1970s, that re-imagine politics and consciousness through an excess of imagination and feeling, from exuberance to loss.

This course provides a site for students to dig into Media Archeologies through analysis, developing understandings and creatively engaging experimental Media Art and Media Art Histories. Artists increasingly turn towards impractical processes to recover, recreate and activate older, obsolete or abandoned media. This seminar course will encourage and inform students studio production through careful considerations of the theory-practices of the Media Archeological approach, so-called 'Slow Technologies', critical responses to planned obsolescence, re-purposing the past through alternative processes, and variously related experimental methods. The course draws from a framework of visiting guests who speak to this range of activities.

This class deals specifically with questions of programming, curatorial ethics, curatorial styles, prominent curators and programmers, contexts, curatorial theory, to curate vs. programming in the realm of Film/Video/New Media. After critically examining curatorial practices of moving image curators and programmers, students perform programming exercises, launch their own public exhibitions, and write critical texts about film/video programming.

This course is designed to acquaint first year, first semester Film, Video, New Media, and Animation (FVNMA) Graduate students with the technical and conceptual aspects of the FVNMA and to prepare students for their first formal critique. Students are authorized on FVNMA equipment and facilities, and work-in-progress critiques are scheduled every week. Students present work a minimum of two times during the semester, in preparation for end of semester formal critiques. Some examples drawn from contemporary art and current theoretical materials will be considered for discussion.

This class is inspired by Johannes Itten's radical early twentieth-century basic art course developed for the Weimar Bauhaus School of Art, but here using the Maya 3D software, typically used for commercial productions by the entertainment industry. Students will solve a series of formal problems, introduced in increasing levels of complexity. Moving from the 2-dimensional to the 3-dimensional and ultimately to the four-dimensional or time-based, students will evolve their abilities to utilize aspects of light and dark, form, rhythm, color, proportion and volume but in terms of a post photographic discourse, with the intention of advancing a new virtual cinema.