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Lisa Barcy
Woman Without a Past
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Jesse Seay
Likes to Do Other Things
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MakeOut Club
Grad Screening @ Busker
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Film, Video and New Media Curriculum
Undergraduate
3000 Level
FVNM 3000
Media Practices: About Meaning
Extending ideas from the course The Moving Image to the 3000 level, students are expected to specialize in film, video, digital authoring, or other related areas. This in-depth focus prompts a broader discussion, bringing diverse positions together in critical dialogue which concern how meaning is created, expressed, and disseminated. Why be a filmmaker? videomaker? installation or media artist? This Media Practices seminar addresses sign theory, auteurism, genre, audience, reception; and a range of dominant regimes and marginal practices for producing meaning. This level calls for a more traditional research seminar, with students making formal presentations and critical arguments. Prerequisite: FVNM 2000 or FVNM 1101.
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FVNM 3002
Video Production II
This course introduces students to more sophisticated forms of image/sound manipulation, editing, and theory. Pre-production planning (storyboards, scripting, budgeting), further refinement of digital editing techniques, and basic post-production/visual effects are covered, as well as studio production techniques, such as chroma-keying and work with advanced cameras. Students are expected to achieve a level of technical competence and confidence necessary to undertake more ambitious independent work. The class views and discusses key contemporary works and related critical writings. Prerequisite: FVNM 2002.
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FVNM 3013
Editing Aesthetics and Strategies II
An advanced post-production workshop for students working in Film or Video. Conducted as an advanced workshop in which students present unfinished work forcritique and as the basis for demonstrations, this course provides methods for the organization and structuring of materials in short- and long-form works. While concentrating on practical problem-solving and methods for developing and finishing work, particular attention is paid to sound/image relationships, structural continuity/discontinuity, professional practices, and non-traditional working procedures.
Students are expected to enroll with a work-in-progress and finish with a lock-cut of their film or video project. Prerequisite: FVNM 2010 and FVNM 2013.
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FVNM 3020
Directing Actors for Film and Video
This production workshop explores different ways of directing actors for camera, particularly within the framework of narrative and character-driven film and video. The course covers the history of directing by reading theorists, such as Stanislavski, Brecht, Grotowski, Mamet and others. Students study the work of directors such as Lumet, Frankenheimer, Kazan, Altman, and others. Students should be prepared to write, direct, and perform scenes in class exercises. Prerequisite: FVNM 2010 or FVNM 3002 or PERF 2000 or PERF 2001 or PERF 2004.
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FVNM 3024
Beginning Screenwriting
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.
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FVNM 3025
Writing For Film, Video, And Performance
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. Prerequisite: FVNM 2002 or FVNM 2005.
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FVNM 3026
Experimental Film/Video Narrative
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. Prerequisite: FVNM 2002 or FVNM 2005.
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FVNM 3027
Image Making-The World of Do-It-Yourself Image Making
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 in order 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 Intermediate Film Workshop recommended. Prerequisite: FVNM 2005.
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FVNM 3028
Music and the Moving Image
This class examines aesthetic, historical and economic factors critical to understanding the role of the music video/film in contemporary visual culture. Advertising, documentaries, music videos, and experimental media are analyzed. The class engages in various aspects of music-oriented production, with an emphasis on diverse approaches to cinematography and editing/compositing. Students produce critical writings, presentations, and time-based media. Prerequisite: FVNM 3002.
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FVNM 3029
Fusions of Performance, Film, and Video
How can physicality and spatial properties of performance be transformed through a flat rectangular projection of light? How can a film director's shot list be influenced by the acting techniques of Meisner? What can a cinematographer learn from the breath control and movement techniques of Japanese Butoh dance? When film/video and performance are approached as a hybrid form, exploring and exploiting the unique properties of each, fusions between these mediums can truly be successful. This course gives an introduction to established theories and methods in four areas:
1. Dance/ Movement for the camera.
2. Experimental theater/Performance Art combined with film/video.
3. Acting for the camera.
4. Directing performers for film/video.
Prerequisite: FVNM 2002 or FVNM 2005.
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FVNM 3030
Sound for Film I: Practice
This course focuses on recording methods, transferring procedures and analog mixing. It covers acoustics, microphones, recorders and other tools of production. The class incorporates a number of group shoots as well as individual exercises to illustrate wild and sync sound recording stratagem. The class also covers the logic and techniques behind using mix studio. In addition to class assignments, students start developing sound tracks for their independent projects. Prerequisite: FVNM 2010.
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FVNM 3031
Film Adaptation
Students select an adaptable story, unravel it, 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. The first draft of a 30-page script is written, based on a short story selected for the class. Prerequisite: FVNM 3024 or permission of instructor.
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FVNM 3035
Sound for Film 2: Concept and Projects
This course focuses on the theories and concepts fundamental to sound editing and design strategies, and expands on the technical information introduced in Sound for Film 1. Students work on existing-film sound tracks and discuss the concepts behind them, particularly how sound works in relation to image. The course addresses problems of mixing, and includes training on the ProTools system. Students develop sound tracks for their own independent project. Prerequisite: FVNM 3030.
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FVNM 3037
Advanced Photo and Optical Processes
This course is an extended and advanced version of the Imagemaking class (FVNM 3027), and may be taken as a sequel to it. This class focuses on film image production utilizing a variety of film printing techniques. Non-camera emulsion-to-emulsion contact printing, JK optical printing, Oxberry optical printing and contact printing are introduced as advance level production. Many phases of cinematographic special effects are introduced in this course. Prerequisite: FVNM 3027.
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FVNM 3050
Video Strategies
This intermediate-level course covers a wide range of aesthetic concerns, and investigates genres, methods, and strategies for working with video. Prerequisite: FVNM 3002.
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FVNM 3110
Light, Time, and Space
This intensive studio course examines special topics and methods of lighting for film and video. The technical details behind light including color and the malleability of space are examined. There are weekly studio practicums directed by the instructor and set-up by students as model solutions to lighting tasks. The following considerations are included: diffusion and reflection; lighting hardware; molding natural light; day for night; miniatures; filtering for mixed light sources; and contrast manipulation. Prerequisite: FVNM 2002 or FVNM 2005. Corequisite: FVNM 3111.
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FVNM 3111
Sculpting with Light Workshop
This reading course offered in conjunction with Light, Time and Space explores the ideas and writings of seminal figures from the history of cinema who use the poetic and sculptural qualities of light and would include, for example, Renoir, Bergman, Bresson, Ozu, Tarkovsky, Berkeley, Wells and Godard. The course looks particularly at the use of light as metaphor, simile and as mode of condensation. How these properties function as abstract elements and contribute to the mise-en-scene in the films of these directors is a major focus. Students are required to write analytical papers and participate in discussions. Prerequisite: FVNM 2002 or FVNM 2005. Corequisite: FVNM 3110.
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FVNM 3204
Literature in Film
Literature in Film is a course in adaptation, designed to provide the tools to adapt a literary source into a functional and precise shooting script or storyboard. The course focuses on close comparisons of literary works and their motion picture adaptation. The process of adaptation, the different options available in the different media, and the issue of "translation" are the central themes throughout the course. Literary sources to be addressed may include novels, poems, journals, or expository writings. Film genres which may be covered include narrative, experimental, and documentary. Prerequisite: FVNM 2005.
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FVNM 3205
Recent Film and Video
Unfamiliar with new developments in the world of independent and alternative film and video? There is a rich, messy, irreverent, and diverse pile of new work emerging: Crossovers, Queer New Wave, Crime Films, Video Narrative, Low Budget Features, Documentaries, Action, Experimental, Underground. From high end to low end, from the the popular to the obscure, this studio course exposes the student to the world outside Blockbuster Video, surveying recent releases and current trends, tracing their roots, and theorizing the future. Through readings and class discussion, the class analyzes, bashes, critiques, and cajoles meaning. Students from all departments and disciplines are encouraged to enroll.
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FVNM 3207
Visiting Artists Seminar
In association with the screening series "Conversations at the Edge," visiting artists in the Department of Film, Video, and New Media present their work, and critique students' work over the semester. Students attend screenings at The Gene Siskel Film Center, and participate in workshops and group projects, and attend lectures by visiting artists. The instructor lead discussions and facilitates visiting artist presentations, lectures, and workshops. Evaluation is based upon collaborative projects, class participation, and papers.
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FVNM 3208
Bordering on Fiction
"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 draw on the age-old fascination with the border between "document" and "fiction." The class provides a context for producing and critiquing student work, and provides a historical/critical grounding in examining work of video and cinema "verite" as well as "experimental narrative" and "new documentary." Prerequisite: FVNM 3002.
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FVNM 3212
Respect: Visual Genealogies of Money and Power
Privilege-whether the aristocracy of beauty or cultural, economic, or inherited advantage-is a fundamental differentiating factor in America life, but one that, ironically, is rarely acknowledged. In this course students examine the unspoken assumptions about privilege that inform both daily life and social history. This class is grounded in a series of screenings of films by Antonioni, Rosselini, Godard, Benning, and Chaplin, among others. It also draws extensively on texts in sociology and cultural studies, such as Pierre Bourdieu's Distinctions, Carolyn Kay Steedman's Landscape for a Good Woman, and the work of Richard Sennett. Students search for answers to questions about hierarchies of power that usually haunt rather than provoke. Prerequisite: FVNM 3005.
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FVNM 3215
Motion Graphics and Visual Effects I
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. Prerequisite: FVNM 3002 or FVNM 2100.
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FVNM 3221
Super 8 Filmmaking
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 learn to transfer film to Mini-DV and projects will be edited on Final Cut Pro or Avid Xpress DV. Final projects will be exhibited on DVD or Super 8 film.
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FVNM 3222
Microcinema and the Short
Although the term "Microcinema" is fairly new, this course explores historical and contemporary aspects of small scale exhibition in an international context. In addition to looking at historical pre-cursors to the modern "miocrocinema" (e.g. Cinema 16 and the New American Cinema Group), this course looks at worldwide examples of alternative exhibition opportunities for the public (e.g Travelling Cinema of Mozambique, Nigerian Video Films and the South American La hora de los hornos) and for independent media-makers (e.g. microcinematic film tours and DIY exhibition). It also covers the practical side of running microcinemas: students produce- program, promote and run- their own public screening events. A combined production/studio/critique class and seminar for undergraduates, this class brings together students working across a number of media and platforms and provides a critical framework to emerging film and video makers. Prerequisite: FVNM 2010 or FVNM 3002.
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FVNM 3224
Independent Distribution for Film/Video/New Media
This course begins with the premise that film/video makers should consider distribution and audience during pre-production. This course explores the history of independent distribution and exhibition but strongly focuses on contemporary practical information for students. It focuses on the business of media-making-how to self-distribute; the basics of promotion, press, film festivals, and print traffic; and seeking distributors and markets appropriate for your project.
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FVNM 3226
Film Festival Production I
Part One of a student-run SAIC Film Festival, the first semester focuses on the practical, long-term aspects of running a festival including funding, calls for entry, and programming. Students look at models of film festivals internationally and determine the nature of an SAIC festival. They secure sponsors, make promotional decisions, and begin a call-for entry and selection process. To be continued in Film Festival Production II.
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FVNM 3228
Film Festival Production II
The sequel to Film Festival Production I continues its focus on practical aspects of running a festival, including programming, promotion, public relations, and print trafficking. The class culminates in an SAIC Film Festival at the end of the semester. Students promote the event, and deal with makers and distributors, press and programming. Prerequisite: FVNM 3226.
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FVNM 3420
Puppet Animation.
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.
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FVNM 3430
Advanced Drawing for Animation
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. Prerequisite: FVNM 2425 or permission of instructor.
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FVNM 3423
Animation III: Sound and Image
This class introduces methods of animating to a soundtrack, and covers use of narrative language, both classical and experimental, more advanced animating skills, and Digital Ink and Paint. There are group projects as well as individual projects. DAT recorders, ProTools, and Final Cut Pro are introduced. Work is shot in a variety of formats: Frame Thief, Lunch-Box, 16mm, Flash, and After Effects. Assignments include: drawing from clay models; storyboarding; analyzing and animating to soundtracks; adding sound to image; and making animatics. Students can animate in any style or medium; Maya Students are welcome, though the program is not taught in this class. Prerequisite: FVNM 2425 or FVNM 3420 or ARTTECH 3211.
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FVNM 3500
Animation IV: Advanced Animation Projects
This class is for students who have made a commitment to animation as a primary medium, and who wish to work towards a completed animation. Students may work in any animation medium-Puppet animation, under-camera drawn Flash, After Effects, Toonboom, Maya. The class consists of working in class on individual projects, and alternates between presenting works in class, and individual meetings with the instructor. Lectures include animation techniques and professional practices, exhibition, job reels, and independents vs. industry. Prerequisite: FVNM 3423 or ARTTECH 3213.
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FVNM 3600
Documentary and Non-Fiction Film
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 the class considers various aspects of film production. Prerequisite: FVNM 2010.
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FVNM 3605
Autobiographical Strategies
There is no other media in which the figure of the artist appears so often as object, model, or protagonist as in video. Since its beginning, an important leitmotif of video art has been the survey of the relation between the image of the body, the self, and identity. The course focuses on a genealogy of video from the "narcissistic mirror" in the early years, to the latest artists' strategies of "opening up one's own history" towards fiction. Examples are screened and discussed. Students are required to develop and present their own work within this genre. Readings outside of class are required. Prerequisite: FVNM 2000 or FVNM 1101.
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FVNM 3610
Documents: The Mechanics of Memory
This studio course chronicles the evolution of documentary theory and questions the traditional definitions of the genre. Students explore the implications of the Grierson-British documentary in relation to the personal portrait, diary films, propaganda, educational, and Hollywood narrative works. Students complete four short films in the class.
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FVNM 3705
Video Installation I
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. Prerequisite: FVNM 3002 or permission of instructor www
FVNM 3710
Video Installation II
An intermediate to advanced level course, this class continues exploration of topics and techniques begun in FVNM 3705. Students develop advanced projects relative to their own installation-derived production, and install a completed work in the FVNM Department, in a studio, in a Student Union gallery, or another location t.b.a. (with instructor's permission). Students preparing for either the BFA and MFA shows are encouraged to use this class as a laboratory for their projects. Prerequisite: FVNM 3705. www
FVNM 3720
Issues in Video Installation: The Social Site
How do installation artists insert their work into the world? How are the points of contact between expressive and mundane, personal and public, created and pre-existing finessed?
Installation art exists in acknowledgement of the worlds, both geographic and historical, in which it resides and to which it refers. Practicing a hybrid of 3- and 4-D forms, video installation artists lead viewers through immersive experiences that are choreographed explicitly in anticipation of viewers' participation. This advanced course offers a focused exploration of the social quality of this discipline. Students develop a site-specific video installation project over the course of the semester. The versions/revisions or the "same" project are produced and critiqued, with each version/revision being presented and assessed as finished work (not "work in progress"). This process allows students to incorporate feedback from previous critiques, develop and articulate continuity within a body of work, and participate in prolonged engagements with each other's artistic processes. All works will be sited off-campus to encourage substantial development. Class time is devoted to site visits and rotating critiques, in-class workshops, research and homework presentations, screenings, and reading discussions. Prerequisite: FVNM 3705 or permission of Instructor
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FVNM 3810
dotVideo
Pixilated and pulled across the web, dotVideo maps ways in which media artists can use the web and internet. From online venues, to networks and devices specifically designed to distribute and share media, the web and internet rapidly alter the way artists produce, distribute and conceive of media art. This course enables students to analyze and create works online with approaches as diverse as webcams, streaming media, and interactive web-based projects. The politics and practices of downloading, recoding and repositioning media are analyzed from the perspective of New Media art and artists. Prerequisite: FVNM 2100 or FVNM 2002 or FVNM 2005.
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FVNM 3812
Realtime
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. Prerequisite: FVNM 2100 or FVNM 2002 or FVNM 2005
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