(Page 2 of 2)
He notes that the essence of the language of screens -- that is, telling a story in words, sounds and pictures -- actually predates the written word, but students lack multimedia sensibilities and techniques. ''Not to have any idea that there are rules and grammar and theories that operate the same as they do in written language is putting them at a great disadvantage,'' Mr. Lucas said by phone shortly before flying to Australia for work on the sixth installment of his ''Star Wars'' saga. ''You don't just transfer ideas from the written world to moving images and music.''
Toward that end, the institute is teaching a new vernacular of expression, one that lends itself to a more fully dimensional way of presenting ideas in a ''visual argument,'' Ms. Barish said. Taking a phrase from one of the students, she said, it's a way of ''adding emotion.''
In more concrete terms: students learn how to juxtapose two images, how colors and shapes convey meaning and story, how to present information effectively. ''This is really a window into a new format,'' Ms. Barish said of the multimedia projects that students are creating from their course work. ''It's a new genre. We know how to write a standard thesis, we don't know how to categorize these things.''
The institute, which is helping the California Institute of Technology, California State University, Pepperdine University and the University of Michigan set up similar programs, is at the forefront of the emerging movement of so-called extended literacy.
''When people talk to me about the digital divide I think of it not being so much about who has access, but who knows how to create and express themselves in this language,'' Ms. Daley said. That language was very much in evidence during a visit to the institute's home in a handsome, low-slung building on a terraced courtyard minutes from the main campus in Los Angeles.
Students enrolled in a broad array of classes were clustered around high-end Macintoshes with oversized flat screens. Ms. Barish, who produced and directed the ''Survivors: Testimonies of the Holocaust'' CD-ROM for Steven Spielberg's Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation, emphasized that the institute's work is not to teach film or computer classes and its focus is not on the technical. Students have only a cursory knowledge of film techniques and the workings of standard animation software like Flash, Dreamweaver and Photoshop when they begin. Before his archaeology class, Mr. Muirhead, 21, knew little more than word processing and how to use the Internet. Within a few weeks he could build interactive Web pages.
Similarly, Alicia Nassardeen, 19, a senior in communications, had no background in computer graphics but learned how to express her ideas regarding the intersection of popular entertainment and stereotypes of African-Americans that culminated in minstrel shows. As part of a three-person team, Ms. Nassardeen was able to show, not only tell, the black-face story. The finished project opens with an animation of Al Jolson's face gradually being covered with burnt-cork makeup.
The project is a good example of using images, music and animation to communicate a feeling that transcends that of printed text, Ms. Barish said. ''It conveys things they could not otherwise convey.''
Ms. Nassardeen now has a new appreciation for the language of films and Web sites. ''You have to know what you're doing,'' she said. ''Now I see everything in a totally different way.''
Michel Marriott is a technology reporter at The Times
