Undergraduate Program
CSC 108 - Computer Applications
Course: CSC
108
Term: Fall 2011-2012
Course Objectives
CSC 108 is a practical introduction to multimedia computing for students in the humanities and business concentrations. This course serves as an introduction to the Microsoft Office suite of software, as well as multimedia creation with Adobe Photoshop and Adobe After Effects. Finally, the students are introduced to higher level computing concepts and animation with the popular animation suite Adobe Flash.
After taking this class, students should have a general familiarity with the most popular applications in the Microsoft Office suite, be able to do beginning to intermediate image manipulation in Adobe Photoshop, create simple movies with Adobe After Effects, and create simple animations in Adobe Flash.
Lectures
The following is a basic outline of the sub-topics covered in the class.
Microsoft Office
- Microsoft Word (1 Lecture)
- Microsoft Excel (2 Lectures)
- Microsoft Powerpoint and Effective Presentation Techniques (2 Lectures)
Adobe Photoshop
- Photoshop introduction, drawing tools, image resizing and adjustments (2 Lectures)
- Layers, blend modes, layer masks, retouching (2 Lectures)
- Text effects, complex composites (2 Lectures)
Adobe After Effects
- Importing video, adding text, basic keyframing (2 Lectures)
- Text animations, Green Screening (2 lectures)
- Complex motion graphics, Animating in 3d (2 Lectures)
Adobe Flash
- Flash basics, drawing vector graphics, fills, gradients, and symbols (2 Lectures)
- Animating in flash, motion and shape tweens, working with sound (2 Lectures)
- Enabling interactivity, event listeners, basics of object-oriented programming (2 Lectures)
Labs
All students must sign up for a lab session. Labs will be held Wednesday and Thursday and lab assignments will be graded. Attendance will be worth 1/3 of the lab grade.
Lab assignments will be available on Blackboard Wednesday at 9:00am and will be due on Sunday at 11:59:59pm. All assignments must be submitted via Blackboard and will not be accepted otherwise. You must include your real name in the file name that you submit. Late work will not be accepted. If you must work on a Mac, please check your work on a PC before submitting it. These files may not look right when opened on a PC (the grading machines). This may decrease your score on the assignment.
Projects
There will be four projects in the class. One each for Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe After Effects, and Adobe Flash. Each project will go up on a Sunday and be due three weeks later at 11:59pm. Each of the projects will require the student to submit a text file describing how the requirements of the project were satisfied.
The four projects will count for a total of 25% of the final grade.
Exams
There is no cumulative final exam. Students are required to take in class examinations on the day and time they are scheduled. Special circumstances or testing needs require two weeks advance notice for the professor. Make-up exams will be available to anyone with appropriate documentation consistent with university guidelines.Review sessions will be held in class the session before the test. Test results will be reviewed briefly in class the session after the test (if there are no outstanding makeup exams).
Grading and Honesty
Students final grades are based on two exams, projects, and labs. More specifically:
- Test 1 - 25 points
- Test 2 - 25 points
- Projects - 25 points
- Labs - 15 points
- Lab Attendance - 10 points
Cheating is easy to catch when everything is electronic. We have scripts that look for duplicate work. At the very least, you will lose credit for the assignment, plus a full letter grade. There may be additional penalties. It is recommended that students simply complete their own work.
For more information about the school's academic honesty policy: