Five Penn Students Win Digital Media Awards

Five Penn students will be able to conduct research using digital media through grants from the Penn Libraries.  

The Seltzer Family Digital Media Awards provide each student digital media tools such as video or still cameras,  audio recorders or an iPad for their projects. The Penn Libraries will provide tech support for the students’ projects.

Blanca Abramek, C’13 will create a blog featuring her interviews with public interest design professionals including architects, designers and community members. Using an Apple iPad, she plans to capture multimedia content for her blog, which will lead into her senior fine arts thesis project. 

Davis Butner C’14 will use 3D computer modeling and music composition software to explore the life and works of composer, music theorist and architect-engineer, Iannis Xenakis.  Drawing connections between music and architectural design, Butner will utilize Xenakis’ compositional techniques to develop a new form of musical notation, which will serve as an idiom for a proposed structural model. “I am eager to apply techniques of structural analysis and composition acquired from my studio and musical coursework in an effort to expand techniques of the design process,” says Butner.

James Lee, C’13, plans to produce a short video documentary featuring professional and amateur dancers talking about their lives as dancers. Lee plans to interview dancers in several countries as part of his senior thesis for his major in East Asian Area Studies.

William Gilbert C’13 plans a digital reconstruction of the ancient  Maya archaeological site of Quirigua, Guatemala in the year 800AD. He will use a Google Street View-like camera that he created to capture sets of 360-degree images along pre-determined paths throughout the site.

Juan Carlos Melendez-Torres, C’13 W’13, plans a documentary film to complement his research he conducted while in Senegal on the cultural and legal dynamics of hip hop music in West Africa. “The urgency and excitement of hip hop is easy to lose on paper, and I hope that this documentary can help bring my subject alive.”