Course Description
Electronic Media Studio: Interactivity and Computation (60-212) is a practical introduction to programming and computational media production within the context of the arts. In this “intromediate” level course, students develop the skills and confidence to produce interactive artworks, discuss their work in relation to current and historic praxes of digital art, and engage new technologies critically.
This is a “studio art course in computer science”, in which our objective is art and design, but our medium is student-written software. Intended as a second course for students who have already had one semester of elementary programming (in any language), this class develops craft skills in text-based, imperative programming using a variety of creative coding toolkits, including p5.js (JavaScript) and Unity3D (JavaScript/C#). Through rigorous programming exercises in these environments, students will develop mastery over the basic vocabulary of constructs that govern static, dynamic, and interactive form, with the aim of applying these skills to problems in interactive art, computational design, and other creative explorations of transmediality, connectivity, generativity, and immersivity.
Learning Objectives
At the conclusion of this course, students will be able to:
- Be proficient in creating computer programs capable of responding to user interaction, in a variety of different creative coding tools, such as p5.js, Processing, and Unity3D.
- Gain familiarity with the repertoire of artists, designers, works and activities around interactive art, generative form, and computational design.
- Understand the role of computation in artworks that explore concepts of transmediality, connectivity, generativity, and immersivity.
- Understand how to document and present creative work online, and in person.