Courses that count in IMA’s Physical Computing and Experimental Interfaces category
Core: Arts, Design and Technology (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
How has our relationship with building materials shaped human civilization, and in return, how does our use of materials actively reshape the planet we live on? Materials have played a major role throughout human history, from providing basic clothing and shelter in prehistoric times, to fueling the industrial revolution, and enabling today’s global consumer culture. In the process, material use and discovery have given rise to many branches of science and commerce, resulting in even greater demand for more material. The consequences on society and the environment haven’t always been positive. This course explores our relationship with material as engineers, scientists, consumers, and traders. Basic laboratory sessions on material characterization will explore material processing techniques ranging from simple resin casting to advanced 3D printing.
Core: Arts, Design and Technology (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 2 Weeks
Core: Arts, Design and Technology (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
This course explores the principles of Interactive Media put to use in the real world. Interactive Media is technology in the service of inventors, artists, designers, developers, educators, and other creatives, who use it to create experiences and devices that are insightful, critical, and thought provoking. Participants will learn the principles of Interactive media (programming, electronics, and design) and how to build projects using the Arduino prototyping platform. We will visit galleries, museums, studios, workshops, classrooms, and labs. We will hear from artists, designers, inventors, teachers, and other practitioners. Israel/Palestine’s art, design, and technology scene and community of artists, educators, museums, designers, inventors, and entrepreneurs is an opportunity to explore the contemporary world of Interactive Media. Visits will include many diverse locations, and students who speak the local languages – Hebrew and Arabic – are especially encouraged to join; however, English will be used everywhere we go. Students will work both individually and in groups. Technical and critical readings and discussion will culminate in a production project that will respond to what we’ve learned. This course will be held in Tel Aviv for the J-Term 2023 session.
Interactive Media (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 2 Weeks
Data Physicalization is an emerging research area. It explores new techniques to design and encode data into physical artifacts through geometry or material properties. Recent advances in Computational Design and Fabrication offer novel opportunities to complement traditional screen-based visualizations enhancing people’s ability to discover, understand, and communicate data. This course uses a data visualization approach to define new methods of computational design and digital fabrication. Students will create unique, data-driven, everyday objects and sculpt meaning into them. Through the use of platforms such as Rhinoceros: a 3D modeling software, and Grasshopper: a visual programming language, students will be introduced to fundamental computational methods for designing and fabricating, as well as the understanding of digital fabrication strategies for parametrically generated design. Prerequisite: Interaction Lab or Creative Coding Lab. Fulfillment: IMA/IMB Elective.
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
INTM-SHU 261-000 (17317)09/05/2022 – 12/16/2022 Wed1:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Early afternoon)at ShanghaiInstructed by Godoy, Marcela
Industrial Design in Action is a course that will help you bridge the gap between your ideas and their physical form. From initial research to conception, you will practice and apply different design methodologies that lead to creative and innovative ideas; acquire a fundamental understanding of form, function and design language; and utilize sketching and visual storytelling to communicate a message and features of a compelling product. In addition, you will become familiar with various Computer Aided Design (CAD) softwares; explore different types of materials for different uses and applications; and experiment with a myriad of fabrication techniques, from basic hand tools to advanced digital fabrication, you will learn to use the right tool for the job. Altogether these skills will enable you to go from prototype to a finished product. In a nutshell, this course is about designing and fabricating things we love. Prerequisite: Interaction Lab or Communications Lab or Application Lab. Fulfillment: IMA/IMB Elective.
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
INTM-SHU 129-000 (17315)09/05/2022 – 12/16/2022 Mon9:00 AM – 12:00 AM (Morning)at ShanghaiInstructed by Garcia, Andy
This course draws from net art, interface design, and post-digital / post- internet practices to explore interactions that bridge screen and physical. Students are led to conceptualize and develop bespoke “interfaces” (in the widest sense), in which either aspects of the web are reflected in the physical world, or – conversely – the habitual mode of browsing is being updated in ways that capture the user’s physical and bodily presence. A reflection of the medium web, its vernacular, and practical daily use is the starting point of this project. The students’ work is additionally being informed by analysis of select examples from art and design, exemplary for ways of re-framing the technical everyday. This course will make use of web technologies (p5.js), and physical computing techniques – and introduce students to various ways those can be technically, and conceptually, combined. Prerequisite: Interaction Lab or Creative Coding Lab. Fulfillment: IMA/IMB Elective.
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
INTM-SHU 201-000 (17300)09/05/2022 – 12/16/2022 Tue,Thu11:00 AM – 12:00 AM (Morning)at ShanghaiInstructed by Haider, Gottfried
This is an entry-level, hands on electronics course for students who are interested in working with electronic hardware as part of their creative practice. Throughout the semester we will gain a familiarity with electronic components, learn to create electronic circuits, solder and use Eagle CAD for PCB (printed circuit board) design layout. Topics will include powering circuits, LEDs, switches, transistors, digital logic, memory, timing circuits, programmable microcontrollers (Arduino), analog input (sensors) and motor control. We will also survey past and contemporary work of artists in this field. In this course we approach electronic hardware with the intention of dissolving technological opacity and inspiring our creative practice. Our goal is to shift the way we may usually think about electronics, as inaccessible, complex, difficult and intimidating. And think about it just as physical stuff that we can dig up and use as material and subject for creative expression. This course is aimed at students with little or no experience working in this field. Lectures will be supported by physical lecture notes, a custom electronics learning kit designed by the instructor. Assignments will include assembling and soldering physical lecture notes, weekly creative assignments (with or without electronics) and a final project. There is a $55 lab fee for custom printed circuit boards used in class, which must be returned if dropping the course.
Open Arts Curriculum (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
While traditional forms of art such as painting and sculpture only expect intellectual communication with the spectator, interactive arts consider the audience as active participants and directly involve their physical bodies and actions. Interactive art invites its audience to have a conversation with the artwork or even be part of it. Well designed interactions add new meanings to the artwork and enhance effective and memorable communication with the viewer through their magical quality. Artists have achieved interactivity in their art through different strategies based on various technologies. For example, some projects have physical interfaces such as buttons and knobs, some projects react to the audience’s presence or specific body movements, and yet others require collaborations between the audience as part of the interaction process. Some artwork involves interactions that require a long period of time for the engagement. In many of these interactive art projects, interaction methods are deeply embedded into the soul and voice of the work itself. In this class, we will explore interaction as an artistic medium. We will be looking at interactive media art history through the lens of interaction and technology to explore their potential as art making tools. Every 1-2 weeks, you will be introduced to a new interaction strategy along with a group of artists and projects. You will learn about relevant technologies and skills for the interaction strategies and build your own project to be in conversation with the artists and projects. You will also explore and discuss the future of interactions and how interactive art can contribute to innovations in interactions, and vice versa. You will also learn about how to contextualize and articulate your project in an artistic way. The assignments include reading, short writing, hands-on labs, and production assignments. Technical topics covered in class include but are not limited to: physical computing, sensing, and interaction design.
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
2 credits – 7 Weeks
IMNY-UT 249-000 (22306)03/22/2022 – 05/09/2022 Tue9:00 AM – 11:00 AM (Morning)at Brooklyn CampusInstructed by Song, Yeseul
Do you want to MAKE THINGS with your computer? Are you an artist, engineer, designer, sculptor or architect? Are you a few of those things? How are 3D scanning and 3D modeling different? What materials should I be using? Should I be 3D printing or CNC-ing this CAD file? What is a Boolean operation and why is it my new best friend? This class will answer all of your questions. Don’t know what any of these things are? This class will answer those questions also. By the end of this course, you will be familiar with all that digital fabrication has to offer. We will cover everything from laser to 3D to CNC. You will learn how to identify which digital fabrication technique works best for your projects. But more than that, you will learn what kinds of questions you should be asking in order to complete a project from start to finish. As technology advances at rapid speeds, digital making machines and software are changing just as fast. So instead of just being taught about the machines of today, you will also be given the tools to teach yourself the machines of tomorrow. Emphasis will be put on learning how to ask the right kind of questions to successfully finish a project. What do you want to make? Let’s make it.
Beginning with the invention of paper, the paper craft movement has roots on all continents. This course is divided into several subject areas: the history of paper and paper making, paper folding, paper cutting, paper engineering, paper automata, and the contemporary DIY electronics and paper craft moment. Each subject area has associated readings, a short research presentation on international traditions and forms, several hands-on mechanical exercises, and one individual creative exercise.
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
2 credits – 7 Weeks
IMNY-UT 246-000 (21988)03/24/2023 – 05/05/2023 Fri9:00 AM – 12:00 AM (Morning)at Brooklyn CampusInstructed by Petit, Marianne
Electronic Textiles spans the worlds of craft, electronics, and computing. We will build skills in the often surprising world of using soft, stretchy or low tech materials where one might have expected hard, dimensionally stable, or high tech materials and vice versa. Weekly projects will have requirements for craftsmanship and design, and will build skills in integrating electronics and computing with soft items and wearables, making sensors and displays, tailoring and costuming, and creating your own materials. You will gain familiarity with materials and with hand and machine crafting skills. Weekly readings for discussion will be required, and presentations and guest speakers will offer you ideas and critical challenges. Pre-req: None. Fulfillment: IMA/B Elective
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
2 credits – 8 Weeks
INTM-SHU 187T-000 (23466)01/24/2022 – 03/18/2022 Thu3:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Late afternoon)at ShanghaiInstructed by Minsky, Margaret
Technology is allowing us to see our clothing as an extension of our body. An extension acting as a system that reacts, collects information, and augments our modes of interactions with spaces and people. Historically, what we wear has been used to express our identity as well as complex issues related to class, race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality. Leila Brillson states: “”What you wear is a part of your identity, and identity is, well, pretty darn political””. Interested in fashion as a form of expression, artists, designers, and architects are now crossing disciplines to explore the realm of fashion. Utilizing computation design, digital fabrication, and electronics they are proposing new wearables to speculate on the future of human existence by exploring the limits of the body. In this course, students will research and work with soft electronics and robotics integrated into textiles to make it possible to add controlled behavior and interactivity with their immediate environment. They will study nature and design wearables, understanding them like a second skin, as well as a soft interface able to gather information and transform itself. Students will also explore the complex geometries and designs allowed by digital design and manufacturing. Furthermore, this course will engage with both theory and practice, and introduce students to a specific design sensibility and methodology in order to design wearables reflecting on religious, social, and political issues. Prerequisite: INTM-SHU 101 Interaction Lab or INTM-SHU 103 Creative Coding Lab. Fulfillment: IMA/IMB Elective
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 16 Weeks
INTM-SHU 185T-000 (23465)01/24/2022 – 05/13/2022 Wed1:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Early afternoon)at ShanghaiInstructed by Godoy, Marcela
In this course, students focus on the study and development of responsive environments, framed within a contextual and critical exploration of the architectural space as a cultural, social and technological phenomenon, and also on the application of practical scenarios for interaction, sentience, and intelligence. Through the making of creative media designs and physical prototypes, students aim to demonstrate how our habitats/spaces/architectures can facilitate novel frameworks for experiencing and living. Prereq for INTM-SHU 138 is Creative Coding Lab OR Interaction Lab OR Application Lab OR Media Architecture Fulfillment: IMA/IMB Elective
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
INTM-SHU 138-000 (17298)09/05/2022 – 12/16/2022 Mon1:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Early afternoon)at ShanghaiInstructed by Didakis, Stavros
This course investigates and illuminates the concepts and the aesthetics of kinetic sculpture and installation art in various forms from creative and historical perspectives. Students will learn to regard sound and performance as part of a sculptural form and learn to work with space. Students will gain woodworking and digital fabrication skills to expand on their physical computing skills to create moving sculpture and installation. The course consists of lectures, readings, and hands-on studio work.
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 16 Weeks
INTM-SHU 228-000 (23472)01/24/2022 – 05/13/2022 Tue1:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Early afternoon)at ShanghaiInstructed by Lee, Inmi
Beginning with a design problem or challenge, and following a period of analysis and research, a designer can begin to draft, prototype, test, and evaluate possible solutions, often repeating these operations several times until the design reaches maturity. Agile software development methodologies, which involve the formation of self-organized cooperative teams, frequent deadlines with deliverables, and a willingness to accept changing conditions and requirements, have radically changed the way software is being produced. Additionally, new applications, such as Fritzing, 123D Circuits, and Eagle have greatly facilitated the process of electronic circuit design. And Computer Aided Design (CAD) applications, for example Rhinocerous and Tinkercad, and newly available digital fabrication equipment have dramatically quickened the pace with which designers can create physical prototypes. Students in this course will be confronted with a series of design challenges for which they have to propose and prototype possible solutions. The first design challenge will entail the entire class working together to produce a software prototype by adopting agile strategies. The second design challenge will involve students in the process of refining a circuit, and will require bringing a prototype from schematic, to breadboard, perfboard, and finally resulting in a printed circuit board. For the third design challenge, students will explore the use of 3D printers, laser cutters, computer numerical control (CNC) machines, and other tools to produce a physical prototype. Students will then be free to work on a personal design challenge for their final project. Prerequisite: Interaction Lab Fulfillment: IMA/IMB elective.
Interactive Media Arts (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 16 Weeks
INTM-SHU 234-000 (19655)01/24/2022 – 05/13/2022 Tue,Thu11:00 AM – 12:00 AM (Morning)at ShanghaiInstructed by Joyce, Noel
INTM-SHU 234-000 (23789)01/24/2022 – 05/13/2022 Fri11:00 AM – 12:00 AM (Morning)at ShanghaiInstructed by Joyce, Noel
Data Physicalization is an emerging research area. It explores new techniques to design and encode data into physical artifacts through geometry or material properties. Recent advances in Computational Design and Fabrication offer novel opportunities to complement traditional screen-based visualizations enhancing people’s ability to discover, understand, and communicate data. This course uses a data visualization approach to define new methods of computational design and digital fabrication. Students will create unique, data-driven, everyday objects and sculpt meaning into them. Through the use of platforms such as Rhinoceros: a 3D modeling software, and Grasshopper: a visual programming language, students will be introduced to fundamental computational methods for designing and fabricating, as well as the understanding of digital fabrication strategies for parametrically generated design.
Interactive Media (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
IM-UH 2323-000 (18515)
In this course we will take a tour of the materials and techniques utilized by artists in the emerging field of biological art – that is art which uses life itself as a medium. This hybrid art and science class will introduce concepts in genetic engineering, personal genomics, the microbiome, epigenetics, microscopic imaging, tissue culture/bioprinting, biopolitics, and bioethics as sites for artistic exploration. Organized in thematic modules students will learn basic lab techniques while studying the work of artists in this interdisciplinary field. The three core areas are: Input/Output (imaging and printing with biology, tissue culture), identity after the genome (genetics, personal genomics, microbiome, epigenetics, portraiture), and final projects. Weekly readings and written responses will supplement lab activities. The course will culminate in the creation of original biological artworks by each student, which will be exhibited in the Interactive Media Showcase at the end of the semester.
Interactive Media (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 15 Weeks
IM-UH 2514E-000 (20014)
This course covers the concepts, techniques, algorithms, and state-of-the-art approaches for robot localization, mapping, and planning. The course starts from basic concepts in 2D kinematics and probability and then introduces probabilistic approaches for data fusion. Then, the course introduces the trajectory planning problem in the time domain and free space. The motion planning problem is defined in a canonical version of the problem and the concept of configuration space is introduced. A selection of representative planning techniques is covered from probabilistic to heuristic techniques. Finally, some mapping representations and algorithms are presented. | Prerequisite: CS-UY 1114 and MA-UY 2034 and PH-UY 1013 or equivalents (see Minor in Robotics)
Robotics (Undergraduate)
3 credits – 14 Weeks
ROB-UY 3303-000 (19176)09/05/2023 – 12/15/2023 Mon,Wed2:00 PM – 3:00 PM (Early afternoon)at Brooklyn CampusInstructed by Loianno, Giuseppe
In this course, the theoretical bases and applications, of haptics technologies with a particular focus on medical applications (specifically surgical, and neurorehabilitative) are taught. Basic technological aspects, such as instrumentation, actuation, control and mechanisms, are introduced. Also, some theoretical aspects related to telerobotic systems are discussed. Students are expected to have basic knowledge of programming. As part of this course, students will participate in experimental and simulation labs to acquire hands-on expertise in haptics implementation and programming. | Prerequisite: CS-UY 1114 and MA-UY 2034 and PH-UY 1013 or equivalents (see Minor in Robotics)
Robotics (Undergraduate)
4 credits – 14 Weeks
ROB-UY 3404-000 (4731)09/02/2025 – 12/11/2025 Mon,Wed3:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Brooklyn CampusInstructed by Li, Rui
ROB-UY 3404-000 (4732)09/02/2025 – 12/11/2025 Mon5:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Brooklyn CampusInstructed by Li, Rui
ROB-UY 3404-000 (4733)09/02/2025 – 12/11/2025 Tue5:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Brooklyn CampusInstructed by Li, Rui
ROB-UY 3404-000 (4734)09/02/2025 – 12/11/2025 Wed5:00 PM – 6:00 PM (Late afternoon)at Brooklyn CampusInstructed by Li, Rui