Online Elective Course

Over recent decades we have witnessed a massive influx of interactive environments, many of which form a significant part of our culture and daily lives. These take many forms such as entertainment, communications, business and surveillance devices to name but a few. Many of these new forms are poorly understood, however this poses exciting new opportunities for future designers and artists to explore uncharted territory. Collaboration and play are essential forms of research and production, both facilitated by and responsible for these emerging media forms. This fully online course examines the underlying features of interactivity combining theories of new media and play with collaborative art and design practice.

This online course comprises a series of six lectures plus learning activities and assessment tasks that seek to discover and understand the underlying 'language' of interactivity and extend into practical approaches to creating interactive experiences within collaborative environments. The content includes the study of interactive media (from non-computer interactions to wireless devices), questions existing conventions of interactivity, explores the notions of play and iterative design (in which new ideas are 'found' by generating successive versions of a project) and culminates in the production of interactive works.

Assessment tasks will include individual participation and online team projects to encourage group interaction and collaborative processes, which are essential to discovering and defining this new and exciting paradigm.

NOTE: This course is conducted via the Omnium system (omnium.edu.au). Students will receive log in instructions via their UNSW email account prior to the commencement of the course. For international students: This 6 unit of credit (UOC) online course can only be undertaken in addition to the minimum 18 UOC face-to-face requirement per session.