policies, grading, procedures
This class meets once a week. Missing one class is equivalent to missing a week of school. Do your best to stay healthy and attend all classes. I suggest beginning homework the day after it is assigned. This will give you time to get help with issues that are not completely understood or issues with the software. I will not be able to repeat 3 hour lectures for students who miss class. If you miss a class please make sure you have contact info for classmates who can help you catch up. Des 283 and 284 are prerequisites for this class.
- lab policy, operation and expectations
Please treat the lab with respect, as a place of study or worship, like a library or monastery. Carefully read the lab handbook and follow the guidelines therein.
Students who do not follow these rules are subject to losing lab access privileges. - student server accounts and file server procedures
- letters of recommendation/references, portfolios, internships
- public television standards
- photos (students contact info: e-mail etc)
- dedicated notebook for sketches, ideas and notes (best if unlined)
- backup media" flash drives, divides, etc. (this is important!)
- time expectations, use of lab on weekends
- work-study anyone? (see Joy Miller)
Grading
You are graded every week on the homework that you complete. There will be multiple homework assignments each week. Homework must be turned in prior to 10:00 p.m. on the day before class. Do not wait to till the night before class to complete your weekly projects. Plan on Murphy's Law striking each and every week. Just like real world deadlines, late homework will not count and will receive a grade of 0 or F. It is your responsibility to make sure you have server access to deposit homework. If there is a problem send e-mail to JMiller@UMassd.edu
Final projects count no more than the work of any other week. Final grade is an average of the 15 weekly grades, attendance and participation. Weekly evaluations are based on depth and quality of project exploration for each weeks assignment.
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Students' success will be evaluated by the following criteria:
- create original characters, props, and environments
- create a full story with a dramatic arc, protagonist, problem and resolution.
- create sequences that contain specific principals of animation. (squash and stretch, anticipation, follow thru and overlapping action, exaggeration)
- create visual transformations that are not predictable.
- create the illusion that screen elements move in a manner that follows
Newton's 3 laws of motion. (cause and effect)
- create convincing illusion of motion that describes line and shape as well a relates to the story line.
- create and type-set typographical elements in a manner that demonstrates an understanding of basic typography such as kerning and placement.
- move the animation thru a pipeline that includes flash, aftereffects, photoshop and final cut pro.
- demonstrate the ability to export quicktime movies and produce animations in appropriate digital media video codecs.
- demonstrate the ability to create a synchronized sound track, including sound effects.
- work within very strict time limitation in terms of sequence duration.
- ability to cooperate and participate in all aspects of a team based collaboration.
- show up for class on time and meet weekly deadlines.
University policy on incompletes:
An incomplete grade may be given only in exceptional circumstances at the discretion of the instructor and at the student's request no more than 48 hours after the final exam or class. The student must be passing the course at the time of the request or be sufficiently close to passing that the instructor believes that upon completion of the work, the student will pass the course. If the work is not completed with one year of recording the I, the grade will become an F(I)
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Student planning on advancing to digital media 4 must earn a grade of C or above in digital media 3. Please see the design section of the umass catalog for a complete list of grade and course prerequisites for digital media classes.
Attendance:
Attendance is mandatory. Missing a class is equivalent to missing a week of school.
Unexcused absences effect the grades of students. Each unexcused absence results in the reduction of your grade by a full letter. Excused absences require either a note from you doctor or approval of a request to miss a class. Requests for permission to miss a class must be submitted in advance of the planned absence.
Attendance is taken only once, promptly at beginning of class and is used in determining grades. This class is about timing. (If you cant get to class on time you are in the wrong field.) An old wise man once said: "if your on time your late, if your are early, your on time." If you must miss a class you can attend the sister class on T or W.
If you do miss a class please alert me as to the reason.
Time expectation:
You will need to allocate a minimum of 6-9 hours outside of class per week. You have one evening homework session reserved for you in the lab. Use of lab on weekends recommended.
Grades are a way to get feedback on your efforts. If your goal is to find employment in this field there are other factors that are equally or more important. These are the quality of your portfolio (including preliminary sketches and story board), letters of recommendation, references, and work experiences, such as internships.
Server Access
You need to log onto umass mail and change your password each semester to maintain access to servers.
Accessing your non-homework personal server storage folder:
When in the labs, in order to access your storage folder, all you need to do is to tap once on Mac desktop to activate it.
Next, pull down the GO menu and select CONNECT TO SERVER.
Or you can type "COMMAND and K"
Joy Miller has already entered the address in the CONNECT TO SERVER WINDOW, which is:
cifs://netwin.umassd.edu/CVPA-Design-Students/
Click on the blue CONNECT button
Enter your user name and password
Click on the CONNECT button.
Class tutorials and shared resources can be found at:
cifs://netwin.umassd.edu/HG-DigitalMedia
WARNING! The above only works on the computers in the labs and classroom. In order to connect from a laptop or home computer, VPN must be set on the laptop or computer. At this time you cannot connect from the dorms but in time you may be able to.
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VPN directions:
When you want to set up access to the digital media folder from your wireless connection of your laptop or home computer you must set up a VPN password used only once to set up your VPN network protocol via a wireless connection.
To set up the VPN acct. password, visit this page: https://email.umassd.edu/activate/
Enter your user name. jmiller for example
Click on the CONTINUE TO NEXT STEP BUTTON
Next, choose: "I wish to change or set my VPN/Wireless password"
Set up VPN via instructions, here: http://www.umassd.edu/cits/wireless/welcome.cfm
from Joy Miller
WARP AND WOOF SERVER
On our Warp and Woof class server, which is physically located in room 252, each of you have a user account to gain access and your own folder located on the server.
Your user name and password utilizes a different access protocol than used when connecting to the CITS servers and is therefore different than the user name and password you use for your storage folder located on the CITS server.
Step-by-step directions connecting from lab (Macintosh) to warp and woof: Using the keyboard, type in the Apple COMMAND key and the letter K
Or,
using the Apple pull down menu, choose GO > CONNECT TO SERVER
In the lab, the address of the warp and woof server has been pre-loaded. In case it is missing, the server address is:
134.88.74.60
Type in or choose the above ip address. If you are connecting from home, this is the ip number you need in order to connect.
Click CONNECT
Next, type in your user name and password. All shall be in lower case, no spaces and no capital letters. Your user name is your entire last name, directly followed by the first initial of your first name.
For example, Joy Miller would type in her user name as: millerj
Your password is the first four letters of your last name directly followed by the first four digits of your student ID number.
For example, user millerj has a student ID of 008956778 so for her password she types in mill0089
User name: millerj
Password: mill0089
Click CONNECT
Anyone who has a last name containing less than four letters, need not worry. Just use whatever letters you have less than four for the above directly followed by the first four digits of your student ID.
After performing the necessary steps above, on the Macintosh desktop, you will now note your folder. Double clicking on your folder will open it, revealing two sub folders:
grades
homework
Located inside the grades and the homework folder are the weekly folders (1 – 15)
Each week you shall be expected place your homework files into the corresponding weekly homework folder (1-15).
A few days later, I shall grade and evaluate work submitted. You simply open the corresponding weekly grade (1 – 15) folder and read the RTF text file inside.
Network connections can and will go down. Do NOT wait until the last minute to upload your work to your homework folder.
Only TEN people can connect to the server at one time. When the server is busy, try again later.
When you are connecting to the server in the labs, do NOT leave your folders and your connection open when you leave. Be sure to disconnect by clicking and dragging your folder to the trash.
Located in all lab and classroom computers inside the "Macintosh HD" on the desktop, is a file named "quick server access" This file contains quick server address connecting instructions. Should you forget the basics, this sheet should help you.
warp and woof music folder:
the directions for access are the same as normall used for W&W except:
user name is: dm3music
password: dm3music