Sound and Image Laboratory

Code:

LSI202

Acronym:

LSI

Keywords
Classification	Keyword
OFICIAL	Communication Design

Instance: 2013/2014 - 2S (of 10-02-2014 to 11-07-2014)

Active?	Yes
Responsible unit:	Design
Course/CS Responsible:	Communication Design

Cycles of Study/Courses

Acronym	No. of Students	Study Plan	Curricular Years	Credits UCN	Credits ECTS	Contact hours	Total Time
DC	74	Licenciatura em Design de Comunicação	2	-	6	60	162

Teaching language

Portuguese

Objectives

Understand the historical, social and technical context of digital media, focusing on their audiovisual potential, in order to integrate this knowledge into one's expressive and critical practice. Develop an experimental practice based on visual and aural phenomena, adopting various strategies and research methods. Consolidate project documentation habits and methodologies.

Learning outcomes and competences

Frame the understanding of digital media into each student's individual practice, whether as a formal resource or as elements of a critical language; familiarity with explicit and implicit mechanisms of digital media becomes necessary for this purpose. Work assignments are aimed towards a free and direct exploration of digital media.

Working method

Presencial

Program

The Sound and Image Laboratory proposes an approach to the fundamentals of digital media in their most bare shape -- electronic circuitry; through its analysis and understanding , we will go through an exploration of aural and visual phenomena, and how to manipulate them using digital media. While the word “audiovisual” or “sound and images” might be more readily associated with mass media, television, cinema, music, or “multimedia” expressions, it is appropriate to consider sound and image in their most essential form, in order to understand how they can become complex, how they combine and accumulate to reach the manifestations we’re familiar with. If we think in terms of digital tools, it is about taking one step back: e.g. instead of thinking moving images as the result of capture and manipulation done in a particular way using a particular software tool, it makes sense to consider individual elements that are brought together to achieve that result: pixels, colour, refresh and frame rates, how video signal goes from computer to screen, are just a few examples. It is about offering a “low-level” perspective of audiovisual media. Through practical experiments in electronics and physical computing, we shall firstly isolate and identify these elements, so that we can later apply this knowledge in thinking and building simple mechanisms which can illustrate a critical point of view over audiovisual phenomena. The students will be given various assignments where the above issues will be looked into, feeding into their technical repertoire in order to effectively apply these principles in creating new, expressive objects.

Mandatory literature

Banzi, Massimo; Getting Started with Arduino, O'Reilly, 2009. ISBN: 978-0-596-15551-3
Nicolas Collins; Handmade Electronic Music - The Art of Hardware Hacking, Routledge, 2006. ISBN: 0-415-97592

Complementary Bibliography

Kittler Friedrich A.; Gramaphone, film, typewriter. ISBN: 0-8047-3233-7
Mark Frauenfelder et al; The Best of Make, O'Reilly, 2007. ISBN: 0-596-51428-X

Teaching methods and learning activities

We’ll introduce strategies such as manipulating, altering and the “détournement” of existing objects through circuit bending, deconstruction and reconfiguration of manufactured electronic consumer goods, “glitch art”, or the use of sensors and construction of simple prototypes through the Arduino open hardware platform. Prototyping methods will be especially focused on, as well as the process of documenting one’s explorations and research.

Evaluation Type

Distributed evaluation without final exam

Assessment Components

Designation	Weight (%)
Participação presencial	100,00
Total:	100,00

Amount of time allocated to each course unit

Designation	Time (hours)
Frequência das aulas	92,00
Total:	92,00

Calculation formula of final grade

Final grades are calculated from an average of assignments' grades, along with a qualitative evaluation of students' attendance and participation in class.

Classification improvement

Only through attendance on the following year.