Course Description
This course examines methods and concepts in contemporary architectural discourse related to digital design media, specifically modeling and animation. The intent of this course is to encourage the student to develop an understanding and appreciation for the design potential of digital media within the discipline of architecture. Digital design media is understood not simply as a tool for visualization but as a generative tool and process for the derivation of form and its transformation. This course introduces the student to the principals and fundamentals of animation and motion graphics through expanded inquiries into digital modeling and digital visualization. The relationship between cinema, architecture, urban space and landscape will expose ideas of simultaneous ‘scapes’ that reveal the presence and function of time within cinematic experiences of space that could inform the architectural design of real space. The course is designed to engage issues of architectural thought and practice by engaging intradisciplinary issues of digital media and the broader implications within their conceptual realm. These issues include systems of analysis, cinematic re-presentation, architectural representation, design expression and the syntactical and spatial language of contemporary architecture. Relationships between abstract concepts of digital theory, principles of computing and design oriented, skills based proficiency will be fundamental considerations in this course. The course will provide students the opportunity to explore and expose concepts of digital media as a design method used to translate idea to form. Digital animation and motion graphics are generative processes that have the potential to influence or reposition one’s understanding of form making and critical visual literacy. The transformation of ideas and meanings through expressions in digital terms will be at the focus of every project in the course.

University of Maryland Website
UMD School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation
ACSA Website
CAADRIA Website
ACADIA Website
Michael A. Ambrose Website