Duration
6 weeksWeekly study
4 hours100% online
How it works
Introduction to Digital Media
Upskill for new media industries with digital technologies
From Metaverse to VR, Netflix to mobile applications, we’re surrounded by and interact with digital networks more than ever before. But what’s driving this digital revolution and how can you harness these transformative technologies?
On this six-week, digital media course from the Communications University of China (CUC), you’ll uncover the processes behind digital content and learn to build digital media applications for our interconnected world.
Explore digital image, video, and audio
You’ll first explore the primary differences between digital and traditional media to understand why digital formats dominate today.
You’ll also unpack processes and technologies behind popular digital formats, from creating digital images through encoding to storing and transmitting digital video, and how digital audio technology enables recording, editing, and playback.
Discover common data compression formats
With this foundational knowledge, you’ll then understand the purpose of data compression in optimising digital media.
You’ll explore how coding technologies can more efficiently store and transmit images and video, and how different audio compression methods, such as lossy and lossless techniques, balance file size and sound quality.
Delve into computer graphics, animation, and games
Next, you’ll explore popular digital formats, learning how graphics are represented and processed, how 3D models power animation, and how game engines accelerate game development.
You’ll also examine the role of computer vision and information visualisation in understanding and presenting data across various fields, from tracking objects with computer vision to using big data and visualisation in industries like finance, biology, and e-commerce.
Syllabus
Week 1
Digital image and video
What is digital media technology?
Compared with traditional media, digital media has the advantages of interactive and fast transmission through the network.
Digital image technology
A digital image is an image obtained by digitizing an analog image, with pixels as basic elements, and can be stored and processed by a digital computer or digital circuit.
Digital video technology
Digital video is video recorded in digital form, as opposed to analog video. Digital video has different ways of generation, storage and broadcasting.
Week 2
Digital audio
Fundamentals of digital audio technology
Digital audio is a technology that uses digital means to record, store, edit, compress or play sound.
Digital speech processing
Digital speech processing mainly studies the speech production process, the statistical characteristics of speech signals, automatic speech recognition, machine synthesis and speech perception.
Typical applications of digital speech processing
Speech recognition technology is a technology that enables machines to understand and recognize human speech. It has a wide range of application scenarios in many fields.
Week 3
Digital media compression
Intruduction to data compression
Without losing useful information, reducing the amount of data can reduce storage space and improve its transmission, storage and processing efficiency.
Digital image compression
Since the amount of image data is huge, it is very difficult to store, transmit and process, so digital image compression is very important.
Digital video compression
Encoding and compressing the original video can remove redundancy in spatial and temporal dimensions.
Digital audio compression
Digital audio compression compresses the audio data signal as much as possible while ensuring that the signal does not produce auditory distortion.
Week 4
Computer graphics and animation
Computer graphics
Computer graphics mainly studies how to represent graphics in computers, and how to use computers to calculate, process and display graphics.
Computer animation
Unlike traditional animation techniques which use frame-by-frame animation of 2D illustrations, computer animation generates continuous image frames by building 3D models.
Computer game
The emergence of various game engines has greatly facilitated game developers. They can provide game designers with various tools needed to write games, allowing game designers to easily and quickly create game programs.
Week 5
Computer vision and information visualization
Overview of computer vision
Computer vision refers to the use of cameras and computers to identify, track and measure targets instead of human eyes.
Visual big data
Visual data information has more mixed characteristics than other big data information, so the authenticity of the data is particularly important.
Information visualization
Information visualization is the application of visualization technology in the field of data. Information visualization technology is widely used in various fields such as finance, network communication, biology and e-commerce.
Week 6
Digital media network
Digital media storage
Data storage refers to saving media data on certain media in a reasonable, safe and effective manner according to different application environments and ensuring effective access.
Digital media transmission
Transmission media is also called transmission medium or transmission medium. It is the physical path between the sender and the receiver in the data transmission system.
Digital media network security
With the advent of the digital age, the information security and protection of digital content have become topics of extensive research by many scholars.
When would you like to start?
Start straight away and join a global classroom of learners. If the course hasn’t started yet you’ll see the future date listed below.
Available now
Learning on this course
On every step of the course you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments.
What will you achieve?
By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to...
- Apply digital media technology to solve specific engineering problems.
- Develop the basic scientific research capacity to carry out research on digital media technology.
- Compare the processing technology principles of different types of digital media.
- Explore the application of digital media technology in different fields.
Who is the course for?
This course is designed for anyone interested in the evolving world of digital media, new media, and media convergence.
Whether you’re a college student specialising in media technology, a professional looking to expand your skill set, or an enthusiast eager to understand the role of digital media in everyday life, you’ll gain a comprehensive understanding of key industry technologies and applications.
No prior knowledge is needed to begin.
Who will you learn with?
Who developed the course?
Communication University of China
The Communication University of China (CUC) is one of the China’s key universities included in 211 Project and “985 Project Innovation Platform” under the Double First-Class Initiative, which is directly administered by the Ministry of Education. CUC was the first communication university founded in 1954 . In August 2004, it was renamed from Beijing Broadcasting Institute to Communication University of China.
Ways to learn | Buy this course | Subscribe & save | Limited access |
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Choose the best way to learn for you! | $79/one-off payment | $244.99 for a whole year Automatically renews | Free |
Fulfill your current learning need | Develop skills to further your career | Sample the course materials | |
Access to this course | tick | tick | Access expires 18 Mar 2025 |
Access to 1,000+ courses | cross | tick | cross |
Learn at your own pace | tick | tick | cross |
Discuss your learning in comments | tick | tick | tick |
Tests to check your learning | tick | tick | cross |
Certificate when you're eligible | Printed and digital | Digital only | cross |
Cancel for free anytime |
Ways to learn
Choose the best way to learn for you!
Subscribe & save
$244.99 for a whole year
Automatically renews
Develop skills to further your career
- Access to this course
- Access to 1,000+ courses
- Learn at your own pace
- Discuss your learning in comments
- Tests to boost your learning
- Digital certificate when you're eligible
Cancel for free anytime
Buy this course
$79/one-off payment
Fulfill your current learning need
- Access to this course
- Learn at your own pace
- Discuss your learning in comments
- Tests to boost your learning
- Printed and digital certificate when you’re eligible
Limited access
Free
Sample the course materials
- Access expires 18 Mar 2025
Find out more about certificates, Unlimited or buying a course (Upgrades) Sale price available until 3 March 2025 at 23:59 (UTC). T&Cs apply. |
Find out more about certificates, Unlimited or buying a course (Upgrades)
Sale price available until 3 March 2025 at 23:59 (UTC). T&Cs apply.
Learning on FutureLearn
Your learning, your rules
- Courses are split into weeks, activities, and steps to help you keep track of your learning
- Learn through a mix of bite-sized videos, long- and short-form articles, audio, and practical activities
- Stay motivated by using the Progress page to keep track of your step completion and assessment scores
Join a global classroom
- Experience the power of social learning, and get inspired by an international network of learners
- Share ideas with your peers and course educators on every step of the course
- Join the conversation by reading, @ing, liking, bookmarking, and replying to comments from others
Map your progress
- As you work through the course, use notifications and the Progress page to guide your learning
- Whenever you’re ready, mark each step as complete, you’re in control
- Complete 90% of course steps and all of the assessments to earn your certificate
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