DMS has a long history of combining situated, context specific learning with theoretical discourses. By combining making objects with thinking of objects, students in DMS are trained to think holistically about media as contextualized systems.
Our undergraduate courses range for 20 to 100 students, depending on the topic. Many of our courses are offered on-line over the summer and winter recesses.
Media Study (DMS)
Media Study
231 Center for the ArtsNorth Campus
Buffalo, NY 14260-6020
Thomas Feeley, PhD
Chair
Chair
Bradley Hendricks
Assistant to the Chair for Student Programs
Assistant to the Chair for Student Programs
The Learning Environment
About Our Facilities
Media Study maintains a range of state-of-the-art equipment and facilities integral to the practice of media arts production including: a student accessible equipment pool with hundreds of pieces of equipment for traditional and emerging media creation (video production, computational media, virtual reality); computer labs with the latest industry-standard and open-source software for digital audio and video editing, computational media, multimedia creation, game design, 3D printing and prototyping; a large production studio with green screen and lighting grid; smart classrooms; a 200+ seat auditorium with high definition projection and sound.
About Our Faculty
The Department of Media Study faculty is among the most distinguished in the university and are recognized internationally for their work in their respective fields.
Faculty List Directory
Please visit the Media Study department website for additional information about our faculty.
DMS Courses
- DMS 100LEC Indian Image On Film Lecture
Discusses the fabricated image of Native Americans in American film history, the media process that perpetuates such images, and the resulting stereotypes; also covers the relationship to social movements and alternatives for overcoming stereotypes. This course is the same as AMS 100, and course repeat rules will apply. Students should consult with their major department regarding any restrictions on their degree requirements.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 101SEM Basic Filmmaking Seminar
Equipment, materials, and techniques involved in the construction of motion pictures; nature and process of the medium; 8mm and 16mm film. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 102SEM Basic Filmmaking Seminar
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 103SEM Basic Video Seminar
Image and sound formation; energy and time structures observed on the cathode ray tube; competency with basic video equipment in production of tapes. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 104SEM Basic Video Seminar
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 105SEM Basic Documentary Seminar
The fundamental theoretical, creative, and technical concerns of documentary and video production. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 106SEM Basic Documentary Seminar
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 107LEC Film & Media History 1 Lecture
Surveys developments in international cinema from the 1890s to the present.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 108LAB Film History II Laboratory
Surveys developments in international cinema from the 1890s to the present.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 108LEC Film & Media History II Lecture
Surveys developments in international cinema from the 1890s to the present.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 109LEC Introduction to Film and Media Interpretation Lecture
Identification of and intellectual appreciation for the elements of film as a major art form.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 110LEC Programming for Digital Art Lecture
Introduces students to programming in a general purpose computer language. Discusses the underlying fundamentals of how computers, electronics, and digital media work; and the mathematical bases of these fields. Presents students with ways that programming can be used in creating new, interactive, digital media art. Recommended for students interested in programming graphics and virtual reality. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 121SEM Basic Digital Arts Seminar
This course is an introduction to computer-based media production in the context of contemporary internet tools and techniques. The course covers image and sound editing & manipulation, web development, and interactive design. Crucial to this project is the concurrent development of a critical perspective on mainstream media culture. Viewing/Interacting with contemporary web-based art projects, interventionist art & Hacktivism, and readings in media theory will critically address the relations between viewers, producers, and media. A lab fee is associated with this class.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 122SEM Introduction to Physical Computing Seminar
This course introduces basic concepts and techniques for designing, constructing, and programming objects, spaces, and media that sense and respond to their physical surroundings. Eschewing the paradigm of screen-keyboard-mouse, this course seeks alternative modalities -- such as light, sound, and touch -- for creating interactive experiences. Through a progression of weekly exercises, students are exposed to electrical theory, circuit design, micro-controller programming, and a variety of sensor and actuator technologies. Students work both individually and in small groups, responding to a set of progressively complex design prompts culminating in both a mid-term and end-term presentation. No previous programming or electronics experience is required; however, curiosity and a willingness to experiment are a must! There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 149SEM Asian Amer Exp On Film Seminar
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 152LR Visual Studies Lecture
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 155LAB Introduction to New Media Laboratory
Introduces desk top tools and fundamental concepts used in the development of interactive and non-interactive digital media. Focuses on theoretical and practical aspects of creating digital messages with authoring/presentation tools. Provides a foundation for creating a broad range of digital media.
- DMS 155LEC Introduction to New Media Lecture
Introduces desk top tools and fundamental concepts used in the development of interactive and non-interactive digital media. Focuses on theoretical and practical aspects of creating digital messages with authoring/presentation tools. Provides a foundation for creating a broad range of digital media.
- DMS 193SEM Fundamentals of Journalism Seminar
Introduction to journalism that uses Buffalo as a backdrop to finding news and topics for feature stories. Course includes practice in the basic techniques of journalism, including finding and producing a print and broadcast news story on deadline, thinking in relation to the screen, and packaging stories for the web and broadcast media. This course will teach you to think, act and write like a journalist. The course is a gateway into the Journalism Certificate program and will provide an introduction to the basic principles of research, reporting and writing for print, broadcast and the web. We will cover essential reporting tools (researching, interviewing, observing) and learn to write hard news stories, short features, blogs, TV broadcasts and reported opinion pieces. You may even write the same story for three different mediums. By the end of the semester, you will be able to produce a news story on deadline for print or web and develop news feature ideas and report and write them competently. If a big story breaks, prepare to cover it. In the classroom, in addition to lectures, presentations, discussions and assignment reviews, students will do writing exercises, lots of writing exercises. Outside the classroom, students will cover assignments in the city. To be a good reporter you have to be informed about what's happening in the world around you. For this class, you have to read The New York Times and Buffalo News every day. This course is the same as ENG 193 and course repeat rules will apply. Students should consult with their major department regarding any restrictions on their degree requirements.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 198SEM UB Seminar Seminar
The one credit UB Seminar is focused on a big idea or challenging issue to engage students with questions of significance in a field of study and, ultimately, to connect their studies with issues of consequence in the wider world. Essential to the UB Curriculum, the Seminar helps transition to UB through an early connection to UB faculty and the undergraduate experience at a comprehensive, research university. This course is equivalent to any 198 offered in any subject. This course is a controlled enrollment (impacted) course. Students who have previously attempted the course and received a grade of F or R may not be able to repeat the course during the fall or spring semester.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
Other Requisites: Students who have already successfully completed the UB seminar course may not repeat this course. If you have any questions regarding enrollment for this course, please contact your academic advisor.
- DMS 199SEM UB Seminar Seminar
There is a fee associated with this course. The three credit UB Seminar is focused on a big idea or challenging issue to engage students with questions of significance in a field of study and, ultimately, to connect their studies with issues of consequence in the wider world. Essential to the UB Curriculum, the Seminar helps students with common learning outcomes focused on fundamental expectations for critical thinking, ethical reasoning, and oral communication, and learning at a university, all within topic focused subject matter. The Seminars provide students with an early connection to UB faculty and the undergraduate experience at a comprehensive, research university. This course is equivalent to any 199 offered in any subject. This course is a controlled enrollment (impacted) course. Students who have previously attempted the course and received a grade of F or R may not be able to repeat the course during the fall or spring semester.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
Other Requisites: Students who have already successfully completed the first year seminar course may not repeat this course. If you have any questions regarding enrollment for this course, please contact your academic advisor.
- DMS 200LEC Department of Art Speakers Series Lecture
The Department of Art Speakers Series is comprised of lectures by visual arts professionals practicing in the fields of visual art, design, multi-media, cultural theory, and criticism. Exposes students to a wide range of viewpoints, art practice, and contemporary theory. Speakers change each semester. This course is the same as VS 200 and course repeat rules will apply. Students should consult with their major department regarding any restrictions on their degree requirements.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 201LEC Green Media Lecture
Polar bears pacing frantically on melting ice; SUVs gloriously conquering mountain terrain; post-civilization humans struggling for survival on a devastated earth: contemporary media reflects our fears and fantasies about our rapidly changing environment. This course analyzes fictional and documentary media that investigate our relationship to nature: climate change, pollution, environmental justice, wildlife extinction. The course interprets the word media broadly to include film, games, social media, media-art, big data visualization, simulation and sensing. It examines the consciousness-raising power of film, media and journalism; traces the ecological impact of our obsession with the latest media device; and ponders the relationship between our feelings about our changing planet (denial, engagement, optimism, hopelessness) and our actions.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 211LEC PLASMA: Performance, Screenings, and Lectures in Media Art Lecture
Performances, Lectures, and Screenings in Media Art (PLASMA) is a new speakers series in which students are exposed to contemporary practices and discourses in media art and culture. Beyond the model of a lecture series course, PLASMA engages students in performative, field-based and workshop encounters with professional practitioners operating at national and international levels of visibility. Six guests will visit the course throughout the semester, with alternating weeks providing an opportunity for critical reflection and discussion. Readings are assigned to complement topics addressed in the work of guest practitioners, including publications of their own, where relevant.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 212LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check the Department of Media Study website for course descriptions. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 213LEC Immigration and Film Lecture
Examines silent and early sound films, as well as contemporary films; as a reflection of the immigrant experience, as a site of struggle between older and newer immigrants, and as an instrument of government politics.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 215LEC Special Topics Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 216LEC Special Topics Lecture
There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 217SEM Special Topics Seminar
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 218LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check the Department of Media Study website for course description. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 219LEC Special Topics Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 220LEC Machines, Codes and Cultures Lecture
This course will follow the history of machines and coding systems from the monastery bell to the latest humanoid robot; from the origins of numeric notation to social media in select episodes. This is not a history course, but an overview of concepts related to information technologies that substantially impact daily life today. Consequently, the course will focus on cultural aspects of technologies and the myriad ways in which they are woven into the fabric of human activities. Topics will include the making of cities, numbering systems, inventions and automation, robots, interaction design, household appliances, software systems, social media and critical design. Students will be introduced to these concepts through primary source materials (texts and videos) and guided through them in weekly discussions. Grades will be based on a mid-semester position paper, a multiple choice final exam as well as participation in class discussions and a voluntary extra credit assignment. This course will follow the history of machines and coding systems from the monastery bell to the latest humanoid robot; from the origins of numeric notation to social media in select episodes. This is not a history course, but an overview of concepts related to information technologies that substantially impact daily life today. Consequently, the course will focus on cultural aspects of technologies and the myriad ways in which they are woven into the fabric of human activities. Topics will include the making of cities, numbering systems, inventions and automation, robots, interaction design, household appliances, software systems, social media and critical design. Students will be introduced to these concepts through primary source materials (texts and videos) and guided through them in weekly discussions.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 221SEM Web Development
- DMS 225LEC Digital Literature Review Lecture
Intensive survey of the field of digital literature through a focus on the screening of digital texts. Primary emphasis is on "reading" the digital texts presented. Course also covers the relationship of innovative poetry to digital media, the phenomenon of the Internet and its relation to "the I", meaning-making through the context, design, and writerly qualities of Web pages, traditions of hypertext, the materiality of code, the history of e-poetry, and digital media poetry in the academy. Special attention will be given to understanding a broad range of innovative works in the medium including hypertext, digital and kinetic literature, interactive texts, and works in networked and programmable media, and to examining, interpreting, and interrogating the key theoretical texts of the most significant practitioners in the field. Includes foundational early theory, writings from formative scholarly hypertext theorists, and work by more recent cutting-edge independent digital theorists. Examines the role of programming as a social, literary, and language-related act. The cultural impact of films related to programming/cyberculture is discussed, with film screenings as appropriate. Discussion of key cyberculture and media theory authors as relevant.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 231SEM Game and Animation Workshop
- DMS 259SEM Introduction to Media Analysis Seminar
An introduction to the historical development of media in modern culture, this course will expose students to a range of critical accounts of photography, film, recorded sound, print, television, video, and new media. We will examine the material and aesthetic components that define various media as well as the political, social, and economic functions that media serve. Lectures, screenings, and discussions will be structured by major theoretical texts and approaches drawn from the humanities disciplines of film and media studies, critical theory, and cultural studies. This course will demonstrate the foundational role of media in the construction of Western civilization, concepts of the global, and contemporary life around the world. It will also provide a solid theoretical basis for all forms of media study, including both production and analysis.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 302SEM Experimental Moving Image Seminar
This intermediate level undergraduate production class will introduce students to alternative approaches to the moving image, from abstraction and collage, personal documentary and hybrid narratives, to stop-motion and video installation, across single and multiple screens. From creative idea development to experimentation with a wide range of intermediate filming and editing techniques -manipulating time, light, color, and movement - students will refine their technical skills and create several short personal projects, as well as participate in class workshops and exercises. Screenings, readings, lectures, and group discussion will provide insights into contemporary and historic approaches to avant-garde film, experimental documentary, narrative, and video art, and inspire students to expand their moving image practice beyond traditional boundaries.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 303LEC Video Analysis Lecture
Viewing and analyzing electronic image/sound structures and compositional models (video art) in a context of contemporary critical thought; viewing tapes, readings, and lectures; having participatory discussions; and entertaining visitors conversant with the state of the art.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 304LEC Video Analysis Lecture
Viewing and analyzing electronic image/sound structures and compositional models (video art) in a context of contemporary critical thought; viewing tapes, readings, and lectures; having participatory discussions; and entertaining visitors conversant with the state of the art.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 305LAB Film Analysis Laboratory
World cinema, American avant-garde, personal-independent cinema, including a view to its European counterpart.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 305LEC Film Analysis Lecture
World cinema, American avant-garde, personal-independent cinema, including a view to its European counterpart.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 306LAB Film Analysis Laboratory
World cinema, American avant-garde, personal-independent cinema, including a view to its European counterpart.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 306LEC Film Analysis Lecture
World cinema, American avant-garde, personal-independent cinema, including a view to its European counterpart.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 307LAB Hist of the Musical 1 Lab Laboratory
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 307LEC Hist of the Musical 1 Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 308LAB Hist of the Musical 2 Lab Laboratory
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 308LEC Hist of the Musical 2 Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 315LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check the Department of Media Study website for course description. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 316LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check the Department of Media Study website for course description.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 329LAB Italian Cinema Laboratory
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 329LEC Italian Cinema Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 331LEC Social and Mobile Media Lecture
In this production course students will become familiar with cross-platform web technologies for mobile and social media, in the context of a critical perspective of media culture.
- DMS 333LEC World Cinema Lecture
This class explores a range of competing terms at the intersection of transnationalism, globalization and political/activist cinema. These include 'Third Cinema' (Solanas & Getino), 'Intercultural Cinema' (Marks), 'Accented Cinema' (Naficy), 'Minor Cinema' (Deleuze and others), etc. Topics for discussion include global flows, border crossing, place and displacement, migration and mobility, minorities and diaspora, social invisibility and censorship, protest and resistance.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 341SEM Intermediate Video Workshop Seminar
Lab fee. Workshop in the tools of video. Offers exercises in intermediate video production for students who have had some previous exposure to video as a creative medium. Emphasizes the development of technical skills and knowledge which are necessary for the effective use of video as an artistic tool and for documentation or personal expression. Other topics include video electronics and staging. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
- DMS 342SEM Intermediate Documentary Workshop Seminar
This is an undergraduate-level course that will further develop students? video and audio production and post-production skills through hands-on exploration of documentary and non-fiction filmmaking. Students will work on a series of short exercise assignments, a collaborative project, and a final project. Topics to be covered include: modes of documentary; non-fiction story-telling; observational/verit? shooting and audio recording techniques; the interview (approaches, set-up, lighting); lighting for documentary; video technology, in particular, the equipment and resources available to you in Media Study; image and sound editing; preparing video for online distribution, and additional topics to be decided. Regular screenings of non-fiction work will take place. A lab fee of is assessed for this course.
- DMS 343LEC Digital Post Production
- DMS 350LEC Information Theories Lecture
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 375LEC Science, Culture, and Emerging Media Lecture
Introduces critical issues in science, culture, and emerging media-especially as they pertain to contemporary artistic practice. Topics are addressed through artists' works; selected readings include historical trends, biotechnology, virtuality, net theory, and cultural resistance. Lab fee. This course is the same as VS 375, and course repeat rules will apply. Students should consult with their major department regarding any restrictions on their degree requirements.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 381LAB Film Comedy Laboratory
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 381LEC Film Comedy Lecture
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 382SEM Politics of Pop Culture Seminar
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 388LEC Screenwriting Lecture
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 394LEC Topics in Asian Cinema Lecture
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 396LEC South Asian Cinema: Bollywood and Beyond Lecture
This course is a chronological exploration of Hindi cinema, stretching from the 1940s to the present. With its flashy item numbers, chocolate heroes, masala films, and playback singers, Bollywood films offer delights that no other genre can. But beneath its flashy exterior, Bollywood also offers moral lessons for social uplift, provides examples of changing class and family dynamics, tracks the influence of the West on a decidedly South Asian art form, and has its finger perennially on the cultural pulse of India.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 400SEM Film Workshop I Seminar
Creative explorations and experimental articulations of primary cinematic realities; encourages development of personal styles.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 401SEM Adv Cinematography Seminar
Media production course focusing on advanced moving image creation in film and video.
- DMS 402SEM Adv Editing
- DMS 403SEM Advanced Documentary Production Seminar
Principles and theory of documentary form, ethical issues, methods. Production work in digital video, audio, web based media or still photography.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 404SEM Advanced Documentary Prod
- DMS 405LEC Ethnographic Media Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 405SEM Ethnographic Media Seminar
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 406SEM Ethnographic Film Seminar
Provides a critical understanding of ethnographic media and cultural documentary. Combines theory and hands-on production practice. Examines cross cultural issues of representation, marginality, community collaboration, indigenous media and fieldwork for media.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 407LAB Hist of Soviet Film 1 Lab Laboratory
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 407LEC Hist of Soviet Film 1 Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 408LAB Hist of Soviet Film 2 Lab Laboratory
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 408LEC Hist of Soviet Film 2 Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 409LLB Nonfiction Film Lecture
Screenings and discussion related to examining non-fiction and documentary film and video from 1920 to the present, including cinema verit, experimental, reflexive, diary, political, music television, and political documentaries.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 410LEC Non Fiction Film Lecture
This course examines the history and theoretical development of independent documentary/nonfiction film as both an established art form and as an instrument for constructing social knowledge and/or social activism. Using the conventions and methods of media studies, the class looks at extraordinary works of documentary, primarily from the 1970?s to the present, and analyzes the nature of nonfiction film?s compelling effect on viewers. We look at film?s capacity for intimate viewer engagement, and we focus on the curious relationship between images of reality and reality itself. Beginning with Nanook of the North and spanning more than a century, documentary film has had a far greater influence on narrative cinema than many people realize.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
Prerequisites: Sophomores, Juniors and Seniors only
- DMS 411SEM Film and Media Theory
- DMS 412LAB Theory of Film Narrative Laboratory
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 412SEM Theory of Film Narrative Seminar
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 413LEC The Filmic Text
- DMS 414LEC Film Narrative Lecture
Narrative films are films that, in the simplest terms, tell a story. This course examines how films narrate this story. It approaches the film as a text - a set of representational, organizational, and discursive cues that deliver the story information to the audience.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 415LAB Special Topics Laboratory
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check the Department of Media Study website for course description. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 415LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check the Department of Media Study website for course description. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 416LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check the Department of Media Study website for course description. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 417LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check website for course descriptions. http://mediastudy.buffalo.edu/dms-courses/undergraduate/current-undergraduate/ There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 418LAB Special Topic Lab Laboratory
Credits: 2
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 418LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check website for course descriptions. http://mediastudy.buffalo.edu/dms-courses/undergraduate/current-undergraduate/ There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 419SEM Advanced Digital Arts Production Seminar
The conceptual and practical production of digital art, primarily focusing on the manipulation and generation of moving images and sounds from within a computer environment.
- DMS 420SEM Advanced Digital Arts Production Seminar
There is a fee associated with this course. The conceptual and practical production of digital art, primarily focusing on the manipulation and generation of moving images and sounds from within a computer environment.
- DMS 421LAB Designed Play Laboratory
Focuses on the changing role of "play" and its impact on contemporary cultural production. Investigates the following topics: how we currently define play - is it aimless, productive, meaningful; production of "play" and use of game-based models in consumer, educational and corporate culture; shifting boundaries between work and leisure. Integrates studio assignments with theoretical research and analysis from a broad range of platforms including: digital and non-digital gaming, virtual worlds, public space and situated technologies, interactive and environmental design.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 422LAB Special Topics Laboratory
Topics vary by semester.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 422SEM Special Topics Seminar
Topics vary by semester.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Winter
- DMS 423LAB Programming Graphics I Laboratory
Production course. Introduces students to the concepts and practice of programming 2-D computer graphics using C++, Open GL, the GLUT libraries, and a basic sound server. The major focus is on creating interactive art experiences by programming both graphics and sound. Students write their own code to create customized computer tools and visuals and learn the fundamentals of graphics programming. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
- DMS 423SEM Programming Graphics I Seminar
Production course. Introduces students to the concepts and practice of programming 2-D computer graphics using C++, Open GL, the GLUT libraries, and a basic sound server. The major focus is on creating interactive art experiences by programming both graphics and sound. Students write their own code to create customized computer tools and visuals and learn the fundamentals of graphics programming. There is a fee associated with this class.
- DMS 424LAB Programming Graphics II
- DMS 424SEM Programming Graphics II
- DMS 425SEM Visual Media Poetics Seminar
Provides an opportunity to explore the expressive potential of language as a creative material, with a focus on its alphabetic, visual, and aural levels, with a focus on forms of visual expression, including Concrete Poetry. We will be thinking about the multiple possibilities of language, as a conjunction of possibilities, textures, tones, meanings, and media. We will look at digital literature as a merging of form, image, language, and sound, and we will explore works that somehow do this to extraordinary effect.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 426LAB Sound Media Poetics Laboratory
Experimental poetry, sound poetry, and digital media poetry share certain features of improvisation, composition, and structure. This seminar will concentrate on a close examination of innovative literary and media forms from the perspective of sound. It will involve careful reading of experimental poetry, close listening to sound poetry, and examination of digital media works, where applicable.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
- DMS 426SEM Sound Media Poetics Seminar
Experimental poetry, sound poetry, and digital media poetry share certain features of improvisation, composition, and structure. This seminar will concentrate on a close examination of innovative literary and media forms from the perspective of sound. It will involve careful reading of experimental poetry, close listening to sound poetry, and examination of digital media works, where applicable.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 427LEC Production Management Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 428SEM 2d Animation Graphics Seminar
Introduces students to major concepts in 2D animation and motion graphic design. Topics include developing concepts, rotoscoping, interpolated animation, and composing animation with video. Surveys the history of animation, fine arts animation, and contemporary trends in motion graphic design. Students will produce a finished portfolio of animation and motion graphic design work. (Production intensive design course.)
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 429LAB Italian Cinema Laboratory
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 429LEC Italian Cinema I Lecture
Examines contemporary Italian society mirrored in the movies, especially Italian film from the 1930s, or fascist era, to the present. This course is the same as ITA 429, and course repeat rules will apply. Students should consult with their major department regarding any restrictions on their degree requirements.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 430LLB The Dream in Film and TV Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 431LAB Advanced Modeling Laboratory
Advanced program on modeling. The objectives of this course are to illustrate the importance of context on the modeling process; focus on the development of a creative, individualized, working methodology; and build practical, technical and organizational skills. Students will learn a variety of methods of importing information from real-life measurements, data-bases, clients, into the modeling process. The core of the course will be hands on work, designing, planning, modeling. Students will be taken through the steps of the production process from content design, through design of a production pipeline, to implementation. The final objective will be to produce a substantive modeling project.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 431SEM Advanced Modeling Seminar
Advanced program on modeling. The objectives of this course are to illustrate the importance of context on the modeling process; focus on the development of a creative, individualized, working methodology; and build practical, technical and organizational skills. Students will learn a variety of methods of importing information from real-life measurements, data-bases, clients, into the modeling process. The core of the course will be hands on work, designing, planning, modeling. Students will be taken through the steps of the production process from content design, through design of a production pipeline, to implementation. The final objective will be to produce a substantive modeling project.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 434SEM Special Topics Seminar
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check website for course descriptions. http://mediastudy.buffalo.edu/dms-courses/undergraduate/current-undergraduate/ There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 435SEM Scriptwriting: All Media Seminar
In this production workshop students will concentrate on writing and editing scripted elements for their media projects. The course will explore both traditional and experimental methods for generating and structuring text for fictional, documentary, time-based and interactive work. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 436SEM Narrative Filmmkg B:Prdct
- DMS 438SEM Building a Vr Art Project I Seminar
For students with graphics programming experience and 3-D modeling packages (specifically Maya). Students collaborate as teams to build immersive virtual reality art experiences. Introduces the student to the Ygdrasil system, a high-level VR authoring toolkit for large- scale art projects. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 439SEM Building a Vr Art Project II Seminar
In this sequel to DMS 438 students extend their skills with VR authoring tools and programming/modeling for real-time applications. Focuses on networking with remote sites, as well as the use of agents, smart environments, gaming techniques, interface and interactivity, and effective sound design in VR.
- DMS 440LAB Women Directors Laboratory
Provides a critical understanding of women as feature film directors. Looks at English-language productions from the 1990s by a cross-generation of emerging and established filmmakers, including Jane Campion, Julie Dash, and Mary Harron. Also considers the "uncomfortable truths" regarding underrepresentation of women directing both studio and independent productions.
Credits: 1
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 440SEM Women Directors Seminar
Provides a critical understanding of women as feature film directors. Looks at English-language productions from the 1990s by a cross-generation of emerging and established filmmakers, including Jane Campion, Julie Dash, and Mary Harron. Also considers the "uncomfortable truths" regarding underrepresentation of women directing both studio and independent productions.
Credits: 3
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 441SEM Advanced Video Production Seminar
There is a fee associated with this course. Making independent video art: camera work, editing, acting, and directing. Group exercises and critiques. Requires video production and postproduction outside of class.
- DMS 442SEM Advanced Video Production Seminar
Making independent video art: camera work, editing, acting, and directing. Group exercises and critiques. Requires video production and postproduction outside of class. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
- DMS 446SEM Interface Design Seminar
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 447SEM Sound Design Seminar
Explores issues and techniques in the area of sound design and audio production. Contextualizes the relation between image and sound by drawing from many media forms, existing and/or original, to create and visually represent sound. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
- DMS 448SEM Games, Gender and Culture Seminar
Comprehensive investigation of the emerging field of Games Studies, the critical analysis of games and interactive environments made possible by the computer. Addresses different theoretical perspectives that view games and gaming as historical, social, cultural. aesthetic, technical, performative, and cognitive phenomenon. Examines how video games encompass an increasingly diverse set of practices, populations, and locations from fantasy football to multi-player medieval fantasy, from simulations of real life to alternate realities, from fanatics to activists, from nightclubs to competitive arenas to public streets to the classroom; from consoles to mobile phones, to large screen projections. Analyses not only popular games but interactive installations, pervasive games, mixed and virtual reality environments. Discusses the interdisciplinary nature of a cultural practice which depends on art, artificial intelligence, computer graphics, etc.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 450LEC Film & Dev of Contemp Art Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 451LAB Avant-Garde Cinema Laboratory
Examines the history of the so-called avant-garde, from the Russian and French avant-garde of the 1920s to the postwar European and American experimental milieu. While focusing principally on Europe and North America, the course gives attention to related developments in Africa, Asia, and South America, depending on availability. Questions of methodology, canon, genre, marginality, oppositionality, plagiarism, primitivism, originality, and ideology come into theoretical play while we examine the Institutional Mode and its discontents.
- DMS 451LEC Avant-Garde Cinema Lecture
Examines the history of the so-called avant-garde, from the Russian and French avant-garde of the 1920s to the postwar European and American experimental milieu. While focusing principally on Europe and North America, the course gives attention to related developments in Africa, Asia, and South America, depending on availability. Questions of methodology, canon, genre, marginality, oppositionality, plagiarism, primitivism, originality, and ideology come into theoretical play while we examine the Institutional Mode and its discontents.
- DMS 452LLB Films of the Civil Rights Lecture
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 455LEC Special Topics Lecture
A variety of media production and theory topics. Please check the Department of Media Study website for course description. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 456LAB Special Topics
- DMS 456SEM Special Topics
- DMS 457SEM Locative Media and the City Seminar
The recent convergence of film, video, and sound as delivered via mobile media is explored in this field-based production course that literally takes place on the road. Students and faculty travel together and work in small teams to create mobile media works that engage the interrelationship of media, movement, and geography. There is a fee associated with this class.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 462SEM Game Design Seminar
Production course on the design of computer based games. Games are considered as a new art form and in order to create compelling games, students must be aware of the particularities of the form in both structural and aesthetic terms. Clearly the most important difference between games and other art forms are the interactive and interpersonal dynamics of gaming. However, game design draws on many other disciplines (writing, drawing, graphic design, architecture, and programming), and that familiarity with the assumptions and languages of these disciplines is essential for a game designer. Core issues of games design; What is a game? What is the nature of play? What makes good game play? What is the most effective use of sound and visuals in a game? How can narrative be used in games? And what are the roles of presence, engagement, and interactivity in games? Encourages experimental thinking about the boundaries and possibilities of computer games. Students work in teams to produce a series of short games projects. Focuses on creativity and experimentation. Thorough, hands-on grounding in the process of game design. from conception to play-testing, and fosters the skills required to produce, examine, and critique games. There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
Prerequisites: Juniors and Seniors only.
- DMS 463SEM Electronic Literature Seminar
For about forty years, writer/artists have been using the computer as a medium for creating fictional and dramatic experiences. Many different kinds of both mainstream and experimental work fit under the umbrella of Electronic Literature: Digital Interactive Storytelling, Games, Intermedia Performance, Interactive Narrative, Hypertext, Location-media, Virtual Reality, Escape Rooms. Practitioners variously focus on visuals, writing, coding, sound. Delivery systems are flexible and diverse: from mobile phone app to physical installation to augmented reality. This course focuses on this expanding and morphing territory. Students will read theoretical texts, analyze work, and experiment with the creation of their own fictional and literary experiences in and around computer media. There is a class fee associated with this class.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 474SEM Media Theories & Approaches Seminar
Discussions and texts based around Media Theory.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 480SEM Social Media & Networks Seminar
This seminar will investigate different connections and disconnections in media. We will map the discourses around user participation and examine the ideological and economic principles of social media systems.
- DMS 483SEM Art Practicing the Body Seminar
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Varies
- DMS 484SEM Language Media Social Vision Seminar
This course examines language, media, and social imagination.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 485LEC Media Robotics I Lecture
Introduces students to the programming of fast and robust industrial microprocessors for art-intervention purposes. Students investigate concepts in the programming language C and write code to control remote devices, sensors and motors. This course is both a traditional programming course as well as a studio course in using computation in art practice.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall
- DMS 486LEC Computational Media Lecture
The focus of computational media is machine learning. Students will be exposed to fundamentals of supervised and unsupervised ML systems and learn how to train a machine on data such that it can reproduce patterns detected in data sets.
Credits: 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Spring
- DMS 496TUT Media Arts Internship Tutorial
Credits: 1 - 4
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
- DMS 499TUT Independent Study Tutorial
There may be a class fee assessed to your student account.
Credits: 1 - 8
Grading: Graded (GRD)
Typically Offered: Fall, Spring
Complementary Programs
- Media Study BA - Production Concentration
- Media Study BA - Production Concentration
- Communication BA
- English Minor
- Theatre Minor
- Dance BFA
- Music BA
- Music Minor
- Dance BA
- Theatre BA
- English BA
- Computer Science BA
- Media Study BA - Critical Studies Concentration
- Management Minor
- Computer Science Minor
- Anthropology Minor