Emerging media permeates our academic programs, ranging from the
next generation of storytelling to
building a hotel that can double as a hospital in a pinch.
Emerging media is the evolving use of technology and digital content to enhance work, play, and learning; broaden access to information, accelerating communications and understanding; and enhance personal connection by eliminating the constraints of time and location.
Here is a sampling of how we meld emerging media with academics.
1. Digital Corps (Emerging Technologies)
Digital Corps is a group of professional and student media software experts who provide high-level customer support in two high-end campus computer labs and media software training for students and professionals in Apple's Final Cut Studio and the Adobe Creative Suite.
Students learn emerging media applications, enhance their knowledge by teaching others, and use those skills to create a variety of projects for the campus community and outside clients.
Digital Corps projects include Web sites, videos, widgets, digital billboards, and much more. Perhaps one of the most fun recent projects from the Digital Corps is the Chirper, a way to show school spirit with your iPod or iPhone. You can download the program in iTunes. Jonathan Huer led the project.
2. Emerging Media Journalism
The emerging media journalism program prepares students to become journalism leaders throughout their careers. The Departments of Telecommunications and Journalism combined forces to revamp journalism and telecommunications–broadcast courses to prepare students for jobs in all types of multimedia journalism. Graduates of this program will be able to provide quality, in-depth news across multiple platforms and drive the necessary changes to help the media industry succeed now and in the future.
3. Institute for Digital Entertainment and Education
The Institute for Digital Entertainment and Education (IDEE) is a destination point of digital media learning as well as a creator of new content and distribution products for traditional and nontraditional media platforms such as film and video, DVD, Web, and podcasts. Students with talent in writing, acting, Web design, and photography are closely mentored as they collaborate and create groundbreaking ways to tell stories, all the while gaining unparalleled professional-level experience.
4. Institute for Digital Fabrication
The Institute for Digital Fabrication (IDF) links cutting-edge industrial computer technology with architectural design, allowing greater customization, increased efficiency, and greater output potential in digital manufacturing processes. Students involved in immersive digital fabrication experiences develop relationships with professionals that can position them at the forefront of the fabrication industry when they graduate.
IDF's 12 credit-hour certificate program in digital design and fabrication is designed to arm design professionals, fabricators, manufacturers and other non-traditional students with digital information management skills and experience in engaging with industry partners in an open and collaborative environment. The combination of on-campus, off-campus, and long-distance/online course modules provides maximum flexibility for working professionals.
The certificate program includes a foundations course, immersive studio experiences, and courses in advanced computational design, three-dimensional prototyping and technology education. In addition to earning the certificate, students amy also apply the courses to Master's degrees in architecture and historic preservation at Ball State, pending acceptance into a graduate degree program.
5. Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts
The Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts (IDIA) is a collaborative interactive design studio, established as part of the Digital Exchange—the digital media initiative at Ball State University’s Center for Media Design and funded by Lilly Endowment Inc. IDIA explores the intersections between science, technology, and the arts—producing simulations, games, visualizations, human computer interface, and augmented and virtual reality. Students, faculty, and industry partners collaborate on national and international projects through this immersive learning center. The curricular centerpiece of the IDIA engages students in experiential, project-based learning—investigating the forefront of discourse in emergent media arts.
6. International Virtual Architecture Studio
Through the online virtual world of Second Life, students from Ball State University's College of Architecture and Planning (CAP) are working with their counterparts in Central and South America to design a downtown hotel that can be converted to a medical facility during an emergency. The students may be meeting in a virtual studio, but they are working with Indianapolis-based BSA Life Structures and addressing an actual building site in Indianapolis.
7. Minor in Digital Media
The digital media minor teaches students how to bring the power of new media to their areas of study. By combining writing, video, and sound, new forms of storytelling are created that will ultimately apply to a vast audience of consumers, colleagues, and clients. Participants include the Department of Art, Department of Communication Studies, Department of Journalism, School of Music, and the Department of Telecommunications.
8. Multimedia Production
Telecommunications students specializing in multimedia production are preparing for a career in the developing and changing media arenas of television, radio, film, and the Internet. The program uses digital technology to create content for television, radio, film, and interactive products, including DVDs, CD-ROMs, blogs, podcasts, Web sites, and more.
Courses focusing on emerging media
Ball State offers a wide range of courses through these programs and others that focus on emerging media. Here are just a few notable examples of the experiences available to our students:
The Aesthetic Camera
The Aesthetic Camera is a film course pioneered in the virtual Internet environs of Second Life. Through the Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts (IDIA), years of innovation in 3-D animation and virtual applications now allow students—through their avatars (Second Life personas)—to check out cameras, dollies, light systems, and more to create their own original movies. The course received top honors at the 2008 Campus Technology magazine Innovator competition.
iMedia News Design
This collaboration between the Center for Media Design and professors from the computer science, telecommunications, and journalism departments, seeks to prepare students for a converging and interactive news environment. Students conduct research to learn about different interfaces. The course focuses on incorporating advertising into the news interface, and students are developing interfaces for the iPhone and iPod touch in addition to the standard TV interface.