Digital Arts Certificate 225 hours Course Overview/Description Looking to make your mark in the digital arts? The nationally recognized Digital Arts Foundation Certificate program imparts fundamental technical and creative skills in digital imaging, illustration, and photography. As a student, you'll learn essential photography skills for different subjects and situations, and master the intricacies of Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. You'll build your understanding of color and composition and explore the representation of form through vector illustration and drawing. Hands-on projects focus on core skills and provide experience in traditional and digital media. Class assignments include digital image retouching and compositing, portrait, landscape, and environment photography, vector and traditional illustration, color and composition, art criticism and analysis, editorial and logo illustration, and advanced Photoshop imaging. Course Objectives Students who complete the program can expect to learn to: o Prepare bitmap images for print or digital media using basic Photoshop retouching

and correction techniques, collage, and compositing. o Develop a basic proficiency in techniques for different kind of digital photoshoot,

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including still life, portraits, product photography, architecture, and action photography. Create vector art illustrations using shape drawing and freehand drawing tools, type tools, and transformation and distortion effects. Gain a basic understanding of creative and career options in the digital arts field (optional elective). Develop effective color schemes for different projects using the principles of color harmony. Create two-dimensional layouts that embody the principles of effective composition, such as unity, balance, rhythm, and proportion. 1

o Represent form by drawing contours, positive/negative space, and 3-dimensional

shapes. o Create vector-based illustrations from basic shapes, symbols, gradients, fill colors,

symbols. o Identify and discuss important movements in the history of art and their impact on

art styles, themes, and techniques. o Utilize advanced Photoshop tools such as transparency, brushes, and the Pen Tool

to create illustrations, collages, and photorealistic art. Course Outline This program consists of nine required courses. An optional introductory theory course is available for beginner students. Course descriptions are as follows: o

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Photoshop Basics: Get a thorough grounding in Adobe Photoshop, the premiere digital imaging program for graphic designers. Hands-on projects show how to select, enhance, distort, color, scale, and manipulate scanned images and artworks, or create them from scratch. Every designer must tame this creative powerhouse of a program. Digital Photography I: Explore the interaction of photography techniques and environmental factors to create powerful digital images. Students learn the fundamentals of lighting, perspective, and set-up and explore techniques for classic assignments: portraits, product shots, indoor and outdoor location shoots, and fast-action sports. Whether you're a fine artist, graphic designer, or Web developer, a mastery of digital photography gives you creative control of the medium. Illustrator basics: Build a working knowledge of Adobe Illustrator, the graphic designer's vector program of choice. Course projects explore selection tools, drawing tools, layers, the pen tool, transformations/ distortions, type tools, and modifying paths and shapes. Tapping the power of vector software allows you to produce detailed and scalable art for almost any application. Color Theory: Focus on developing appropriate color systems for graphic design projects. Projects explore the principles, terminology, and applications of color theory, with an emphasis on manipulating color. A working knowledge of the expression and perception of color, and color interaction, lends credibility and sophistication to a designer's work. Design and Composition: Discover the principles of effective composition in print design and advertising. Composition, literally the assembly of elements, is the artful arrangement that guides the eye and unifies a design work. Case studies 2

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and hands-on projects address closed/open space, negative space, movement, and more. Intro to Drawing: Learn basic drawing techniques and how to see and think about form and space. The class focus is on developing a better understanding of visual forms and representing those forms on paper. Class projects involve sketches of contours, negative space, and simple and complex forms. Digital Illustration Basics: Learn how an illustrator approaches challenges like proportion, perspective, lighting, storytelling, and expression. Discover how basic shapes, symbols, gradients, fill colors, symbols, Bezier curves, and text can be combined to create artwork in Illustrator. History of Art: Build a foundation in art history and gain a deep understanding of art and the artists who create it. Explore profound themes that have concerned artists for centuries: nature, the human body, society, religion, and politics. Through engaging lectures and projects, you’ll learn how to identify the mediums, materials, and techniques artists use and discuss the styles of important artists, art movements, and historical periods from antiquity through the mid-20th century. Advanced Photoshop: Take your Photoshop skills to the next level by mastering Photoshop's advanced features. Students explore professional approaches to compositing, retouching, image correction, and masking. Brushes, lighting, textures, and special effects are explored as creative ways of producing highimpact images for print or Web media. The course builds on a basic level of Photoshop knowledge experience and offers projects that are challenging on both technical and artistic levels.

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Computer with Internet connection (56.6 Kbps modem or faster is recommended). Basic computer skills are necessary but no prior design knowledge is required. Students who wish to enroll in a certificate program must be at least 18 years old and able to provide documentation of attaining a high school diploma or equivalent or higher level of education (such as a college degree).

PC Requirements/Materials Included This course is compatible with Windows Vista Operating System. Software Required: o o

Adobe Photoshop CS, CS2, or CS3 Adobe Illustrator CS2 or CS3 3

Access to a digital camera, rated 3 megapixels or higher. When purchasing any software, especially bundled software such as the Adobe Master Collection, please check that your computer meets the manufacturer's listed system requirements. o No textbooks required. o o

Instructor Bio Students receive critique and feedback from with a faculty of art and design professionals. Instructors for this program include: Dr. Taz Tally is the president of Taz Tally Seminars, a computer publishing consulting and training company. Taz is the author of numerous graphics and print production books including Photoshop Before and After Makeovers, Acrobat and PDF Solutions, Avoiding the Output Blues, Avoiding the Scanning Blues, and is a contributing author to The Photoshop World Dream Team Book. Taz has produced numerous instructional videos, CDs, and DVDs on scanning, prepress, Photoshop, color correction, and font management. Taz is a frequent presenter at seminars and trade shows throughout the U.S, and is a member of the Photoshop Dream Team at the biannual Photoshop World convention. Taz is a frequent contributor to Photoshop User magazine, for which he writes a regular prepress column. Donald Gambino is a computer artist, consultant, educator, and trainer since 1983, teaching students of all levels and abilities. Formerly the Chairperson of the Computer Art Department at the School of Visual Arts in New York City, he has taught innovative computer art courses for over 12 years, and created the BFA program in Computer Art. Ken Milburn is a professional photographer and leading expert in digital photography. Ken's photographic career has ranged from starlet publicity photos for Universal Pictures, to album covers, advertising, and editorial work for the TV Guide and Los Angeles Times Sunday Magazine. His work has been featured in Design Graphics Magazine and Computer Graphics World. Ken is the principal author of 20 computer and photography books including Digital Photography: Expert Techniques from O'Reilly Associates, and The Digital Photography Bible from Wiley and Sons, and several books on Photoshop techniques. Ken has written more than 300 articles on digital media, featured in Publish, DV Magazine, MacWorld, Computer Graphics World, PC World, and InfoWorld. Michael Hamm is a freelance designer and web developer with more than 8 years of experience in the field of interactive design. Based in Houston, Texas, Michael previously worked for JPMorgan Chase as an interactive designer. Michael's work has 4

been published in various Web design books and magazines. In addition, he has served as technical editor on several design books published by Friends of Ed. Michael is an Adobe Certified Expert (ACE) in Adobe Illustrator and he is the founder, designer, programmer, and writer of Ergodraw.com, a Web site that grew from his passion for the illustration software and all things vector. Piper Nilsson is a graphic designer and information architect. In her four-year career for a leading Web design agency, she blueprinted sites for such global clients as MetLife, Pepsi, ETS, and Citibank. Her current projects include building an e-learning prototype for children with learning disabilities and teaching technology in New York City public schools. She received a degree in graphic design from Pratt Institute. Andrew Shalat is an author, designer/illustrator, educator, and Mac expert. Since 1985 he has been designing and writing articles for Macintosh, Mac software, and publishing technologies that have appeared in Macworld, maccentral.com and macweek.com (for which he was a columnist writing "Shalat's Web"). He currently has two books: Do It Yourself Mac Projects, published by McGraw-Hill, and MacDesign Out of the Box, published by Inside Mac Press. Andrew's design work covers a large range of media including book, CD and DVD covers, brochures, catalogs, outdoor signage, print ads, artwork, logos, Flash and Web design, and grocery lists. Over the past two decades, he's taught literature, writing, Web design, and print design. Jordon Schranz, a 7-year inhabitant of Brooklyn, New York, is represented by the Black and White Gallery in New York, New York. He has had one-man shows in both New York and Chicago and he has participated in several group shows in the USA and internationally. His work is also included in several private collections as well as the collection of the Museum of Air and Space in Moscow, Russia. His work focuses on the idea of social and political interaction and how the media influences it. In addition, Jordon Schranz regularly stages, performs, and promotes avante garde, free jazz and experimental music performances and is a recording artist on the Black Saint record label with his group “The Eastern Seaboard”. Jordon is currently leading the development of a Fine Arts program at Sessions. Jordon earned his BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art. Carolina Caycedo is an emerging contemporary artist whose most recent exhibitions were at Blow de la Barra in London, UK, and Galeria Comercial in Puerto Rico. Her fine art and photography collections have been written about in The New York Times, Artfacts.net, Artecontexto, The Nation, and Art Dispatches. Photography from Carolina's bartering project, entitled "Daytoday," was featured at the Whitney Museum of Art in New York City. Carolina has given talks about art at The Whitney Museum in New 5

York, The Art, Memory, and City Seminar in Bogota, and the National University in Bogota. She has been an artist-in-residence at the Contemporary Artists Center in Massachusetts and at Foraneza in Puerto Rico. Carolina was born in London and educated in Colombia. She earned her BA in Fine Arts from Los Andes University. Matt Kloskowski is a writer, instructor, illustrator, and graphic designer based in Tampa, Florida. Author of Illustrator Most Wanted and Extreme Photoshop, Matt is certified as an Adobe Certified Expert, in Macromedia Flash, and as a Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer (MCSD). An expert in dynamic- and database-driven Web development, Matt writes weekly columns for the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) and Mac Design magazine's Web site and features for Create Magazine’s Studio column. Matt's tutorials have been used in over 15 schools throughout the United States and translated into seven languages. Matt graduated from University of South Florida with majors in computer information systems and marketing.

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