Introduction to Creative Programming
RISD Digital+Media, Fall 2012
Lauren McCarthy, laurmccarthy@gmail.com
Alex Olwal, olwal@media.mit.edu
TA Jack Lovell, jlovell@risd.edu
Monday, 1:10–6:10 pm
Room 407, CIT/Mason Building
Overview
This studio-based course will introduce programming as a medium for artistic and design practices. Students will learn basic programming concepts through a series of short exercises, discussions, group presentations, and a longer studio project. Software practices will be grounded in a critical context to examine how and why contemporary artists choose to use software, how software written by artists gets used and disseminated via the web. The course will also cover good programming practices and open source ideologies. Students will be working primarily with Processing. No prior programming experience is necessary.
Attendance is important, please let us know if you are going to be absent or late.
Assignments
Assignments will be posted weekly, and due at the start of class on the date indicated, check the website!
Short exercises
The first four weeks will consist of a series of short exercises, designed to introduce basic programming concepts that will be applied to a studio project carried out during the remainder of the semester. There will be some time to work on these in studio. Anything that does not get done should be completed out of class. All assignments will be submitted via openprocessing. Please upload it to the site with thumbnail, title, and description, and submit it to the RISD Creative Programming, Fall 2012 classroom.
Studio project
The core of the course will be a semester long studio project that incorporates software. The exercises are designed to be adapted to fit your interests in developing this final project. In week 6 you will present a proposal for the final, week 9 we will review prototypes, and week 12 will be the final review.
Readings
There will be introductory readings from Getting Started with Processing for the first few weeks. Additional readings will be assigned to contextualize studio work, and how and why contemporary artists are working with software. Please come prepared to discuss these.
Art piece presentation
Each week, besides regular assignments, 1-2 students will have prepared a short presentation of an inspiring art piece that involves technology relevant to the class. The piece will be discussed, analyzed and critiqued. We will provide an example list of art pieces to be inspired from, but encourage selection of work of specific and significant interest to you. Sign up on the website for the artist and week you’d like to present.
Expectations
Programming can be challenging at first, but hang in there. Ask lots of questions of us, your TA, and your classmates. This course is intended to be useful to you and your studio practice. Let us know what you are interested in, and bring in exciting projects and examples you find.
The studio-based course/workshop will be highly interactive and your participation is critical. It includes preparing material and assignments, in-class discussions, critiques and collaborative work. Be ready to share what you’re working on with others, failures can be just as interesting as successes.
Reading
Required:
Casey Reas and Ben Fry. Getting Started with Processing. O’Reilly / MAKE, 2010
Suggested:
Casey Reas and Ben Fry. Processing: A Programming Handbook for Visual Designers and Artists. MIT Press, 2007
Casey Reas and Chandler McWilliams. FORM+CODE in Design, Art, and Architecture. Princeton Architectural Press, 2010