MEDIA LAB FACTS

Where?

The Media Lab is located on the 3rd floor of the UIAH premises. During 1995 the lab will be extended with the building of the New Media Center UIAH, a new lab complex adjoining the current premises. The Media Lab was originally formed out of the union of IMI (originally the Computer Imaging Institute) with CAP, the computer photography lab that was moved from the department of Photography to its current premises in 1992. In 1994 an interactive digital media facility was added to coincide with the start of the new MA in New Media degree program. The Media Lab is a separate department of UIAH which has its own governing board and is not, as many people wrongly assume, a part of the faculty of visual communications.

History

IMI, CAP and the Media Lab

Since the mid-80s there has been a dramatic increase in the use of computers within the various departments of UIAH. As part of the university¹s main strategy a great effort has been made to develop skills in the areas of computer graphics and computer imaging and in the emerging field of interactive media. Computer imaging was first witnessed in the CAD/CAM lab of the textiles department and later in the department of photography in CAP - the computer aided photography lab which was founded in 1990.
At the same time a new department was being planned which would concentrate on education and research in the area of high-end 3D computer graphics and animation. The IMI lab was officially opened in 1992 in cooperation with Silicon Graphics and the French software company, Thompson Digital Image, TDI. A new pilot Masters (MA) degree was initiated with 7 students, each with their own SGI workstation during the 2-year course.
As the trends in imaging became clear to us we developed a broader strategy which resulted in the creation of the Media Lab UIAH which incorporates both the CAP and IMI labs along with a new facility given over to interactive multimedia.
In September 1994 a new multi-disciplinary 2-year Masters (MA) degree was started - the MA in New Media. The 18 students on the course have been recruited from within UIAH (6) and other Finnish universities (12) in an attempt to provide the kind of education needed to produce the leaders, visionaries and producers of the media of the future - the New Media.

Media Lab development

In 1994 the Media Lab UIAH received the full support of the Finnish Ministry of Education which agreed to sponsor the lab directly during the years 1994-98. This guaranteed support has allowed us to plan a long-term strategy which also includes the cooperation of various industrial and educational partners. Apart from running our own degree program the Media Lab is also heavily involved in the development and running of courses for UIAH undergraduates and professionals and has become involved in several large media projects with other universities and national institutions. Typical examples of the courses we provide are 2D imaging courses using PhotoShop in the CAP lab and the Alias courses for Industrial & Environmental Design students in the IMI lab.
New space allocated to the lab will almost double its floor space during 1995 and allow for the construction of four new labs - the New Media Center UIAH. The lab¹s will be designated for;
  1. project work (PowerMac/PC environment) and lectures/demonstrations max. 50 people, 126 sq. m;
  2. distance learning lab using Internet (10Mbit), ISDN and ATM networks, 27 sq. m;
  3. advanced 3D imaging and animation (SGI environment), 27 sq. m;
  4. CD-ROM pre-mastering and scanning services, 13,5 sq. m .

Cooperative Partners

Operating as the leading institution of its kind in Finland it is the role and duty of UIAH to provide the most advanced education in its areas of study and research. During the next four years we intend to develop the Media Lab UIAH to become the Finnish Center of Expertise in the New Media.
To do this we must operate at many levels - develop our undergraduate study programmes and initiate new doctoral programmes in visual communications and media studies. Equally important is to be involved in highly practical research and development work which has a direct relevance for industry and society in general. To this end we have been forming a network of partners to help us to fulfill our aims. Recently we have signed cooperative agreements with those companies which we consider to be crucial to the development of the New Media. These include a three-year cooperative agreement with Apple Computer (the Media Lab UIAH is Apple¹s major multimedia training partner in Scandinavia) and other major agreements with SGI (Finland), the Helsinki Telephone Company, HPY, Kodak (Nordic) and the Canadian software companies Alias and SoftImage. Other agreements are in preparation.
Central to all of these agreements is the fact that the Media Lab assists the partners by providing education for both students and outside professionals using the technology made available by the partners.

New Media Center UIAH

In March 1995 UIAH was accepted to the New Media Centers Program (USA), a charitable organization that helps educational institutions to integrate new media technologies into their teaching programs by providing education, training and the necessary facilities for both staff and students. The New Media Center UIAH is a separate unit of the Media Lab UIAH and will be fully operational in September 1995.

NMC facilities

The New Media Center at the Media Lab UIAH will play home to courses, seminars and projects. The space has been planned to allow a variety of activities to be accommodated. Most courses will be held in the main lab which can be easily be divided into smaller workspaces with the help of portable room-dividing elements. All workstations contained within this main space will be positioned on special wheeled tables allowing a flexible project environment or for part or all of them to be moved to the side of the lab when the space is needed for large demonstrations or lectures.
The three smaller labs adjoining the main lab will provide peaceful working environments for CD-ROM pre-mastering and scanning services, courses in advanced 3D graphics, design and animation and thirdly, projects and courses involving networked distance learning technology.
Additionally the technology contained in the distance learning lab can be connected through into the main lab allowing lectures held in the main lab to be transmitted to other sites or recorded for later broadcast. The distance learning lab will contain Internet access via our current 10Mbit link into FUNET, ISDN using Macs and ATM which we also intend to run on Macs in addition to our current SUN ATM workstation. All the workstations within the New Media Center will be linked to the Media Lab¹s Ethernet zone allowing access to all other workstations and services within the Media Lab and UIAH.

NMC courses and activities

Courses for the New Media Center will commence during the early autumn 1995. Our main aim in the early stages of operation will be to educate the faculty and students of UIAH to become familiar with New Media technology and therefore to encourage its use in their own teaching programmes. Regular short courses and seminars will be organized covering subjects including the production of interactive teaching material, digital imaging, using www and other Internet services etc.

Projects

Projects are a crucial part of the work of the Media Lab UIAH and provide the basis of true development of new skills and methods in the New Media. We have attempted to gain the support of industrial partners in these projects and as the Media Lab is the only Œcreative¹ new media development environment in Finnish higher education many partners have been found and much interest has been shown in our operations. During our first year of operations we gained a very high media profile which has also helped to spread our ideology throughout Finland.
As members of the New Media Center Program we intend to extend our project cooperation to include other members of the program, to share our knowledge and to seek new perspectives.

Seminars

Seminars and conferences are a regular part of the life of our university. Our conference secretariat in the CES organize approx. 3 international conferences annually. During 1994 UIAH hosted the ISEA¹ 94 conference (Inter Society for Electronic Art). This massive event was organized by various staff members of the Media Lab in conjunction with CES, the Sibelius Academy and many other organizations. As part of our current cooperative agreements we are required to organize seminars relating to cutting-edge technologies supplied by our sponsors. The New Media Center will become the home to these seminars in 1995 and also allow us to transmit the seminars via our planned distance learning facility to other sites. Many speakers at these seminars will be leading international authorities in their fields either brought to Finland by our cooperative partners or by the Media Lab as visiting lecturers as part of the MA in New Media degree program.