Digital Media Foundations

This course is for anybody curious about the mechanics behind the media seen on devices. If youre a self-trained designer, photographer, CG artist, audio mixer, video editor, or motion graphics artist, you have a good grounding in the tools you use, and you know the results you want, but you might not know how the technology youre using really works. Its a transformational moment when you gain a deeper understanding of the way digital images, graphics, video, and audio work. Every day youre adjusting pixels and sound waves that have been captured, created, or rendered digitally. Grasping what is really happening when you work with digital media allows you to improve your skills faster, communicate effectively, and collaborate more easily. Get ready to remove the mystery behind terms youve encountered. If you work in a creative profession, this can enhance your command of the tools you use. Learn what a pixel really is, what color channels are, and what audio frequency is. Discover how color channels, bit depth, and video frame rates work. Find out the difference between codecs and file formats, and how compression is involved. By the end of this course, youll know how to answer common client questions—like, whether a logo should be supplied in vector or bitmap form, and more.

Learning objectives
What is a pixel?
Aspect ratios
Bit depth
Alpha and transparency
Light and color channels
Color modes: RGB, YUV, CMYK
Camera depth of field
Chroma Key and Luma Key
Blend modes
Color wheels, vectorscopes, and waveforms
Video compression and codecs
Frame rates and timecode
File formats
Histograms
Audio amplitude
Capturing audio tone as frequency
Audio timing using the phase