Electronic Studio Resources II: Policies

K404/K504 — Electronic Studio Resources II: Policies

Studio Responsibilities

Work on your assignments and project should be completed in MAC 304, the studio for this class. You reserve studio time via our web sign-up calendar. Press the [studio] link at the top of any course page to go to this calendar. You must be on the IU network (or connected to the IU VPN) to do this.

You will be provided with a separate sheet regarding your studio responsibilities. You must sign this sheet as a condition of receiving a key card that lets you open the studio door. We ask that you respect the equipment and use your best judgement in protecting the security of the studio.

Please report all broken equipment or software immediately to both Prof. Hass and Prof. Gibson (email links above).

Guests are not permitted without prior approval and then only for class assignment purposes. In particular, doing work for others using studio equipment (recording, editing recitals, burning CDs, cooking meth, etc.) is strictly forbidden!

Access to Help

For technical questions, questions about assignments, or to set up individual help, email both Prof. Hass and Prof. Gibson (email links above). We try to provide as much individual help as possible, since we understand this is a difficult subject to master. We ask, however, that you double-check manuals and the readings before contacting us, since either may provide answers to your problem. Don't get into deep trouble before asking for help! That is what we are here for.

Computer Matters

The most important thing to do when working with computers is to protect your data. Please do not trust that the hard drives in our computers will hold your data safely: we have had disk failures in the past.

So back up your data!

Catastrophic loss of materials for assignments or the final project is not an acceptable excuse!

Be sure to have at least three copies of your work on different media, in different locations, at all times.

Also, develop the habit of saving in sequential versions. In other words, make a series of copies that reflect your progress on the project — for example, “my project Sept-10,” “my project Sept-11,” etc.

You’ll need some kind of portable storage for backing up your work. A small USB2 flash drive works well for this. It plugs directly into one of the USB ports on the front of the studio Mac. Look for one that holds 2 GB or more. Another, more expensive, possibility is a portable USB or Firewire hard disk.

We strongly recommend that you dedicate a flash (or hard) drive to your work on the Mac and format the drive for Mac OS X. (If you don’t know how to do that, let us know, and we’ll show you.) We’ve found that PC-formatted media don't work as quickly or reliably in OS X. It's fine to buy a PC-formatted drive and reformat it.

We will also be using a file server (cecm.music.indiana.edu) to store your work, but do not rely on this as your only backup medium!

Grading Policy

There are a series of assignments you must complete, in addition to two exams and a final project. The descriptions of all these are online, linked from the syllabus page. You will do the assignments during your reserved times in the MAC 304 studio. Timely completion of assignments is an important part of your grade. For those assignments that take longer than a week to do, we expect to see evidence of weekly progress.

If you’re having trouble completing your work on time, it is your responsibility to contact Prof. Gibson for advice.

Here are the grade weights.

Pop quizzes (drop your lowest score) 10%

Midterm Exam 20%

Final Exam 20%

Final Project 25%

Tutorial assignments, class/tutorial participation 25%

Incompletes will be granted only as per University policy.

Attendance Policy

Because much of the material in this class can only be mastered from hands-on experience and in-class observation, more than two unexcused absences (class or tutorial) or being consistently late will result in a substantially lower grade. Specifically, each unexcused absence over two lowers your grade by one grade increment (e.g., from A to A-, or A- to B+).

Being late is especially disruptive in the lecture, because you may have to climb over other students to get to a chair in our small class room. We usually have to stop class to wait for this and will spend the time glaring at you.

Absences will be considered excused only in the following cases.

Illness, verified by a note from a health care provider who is not a relative
Family emergency
Religious holiday
School-sanctioned event, for which excuse letters are written
Travel for a job interview

In all these cases, please notify us by email before the missed class begins, unless there’s a good reason why that’s not possible.

There is no way to make up for unexcused absences. We do not offer extra credit assignments.

Reading

There is no required textbook for this course. Most of the material you will need is available online. For more in-depth treatment, here is a list of books we have on Permanent Reserves in the Music Library.

Ballora, Mark. Essentials of Music Technology (2003)
Chadabe, Joel. Electric Sound: The Past and Promise of Electronic Music
De Furia, et. al. The MIDI Resource Book
Dodge, Charles. Computer Music (2nd ed.)
Huber/Runstein. Modern Recording Techniques
Pellman, Samuel. An Introduction to the Creation of Electroacoustic Music (1994)
Roads, Curtis. The Computer Music Tutorial
Schrader, Barry. Introduction to Electro-Acoustic Music
Strange, Allen. Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques, and Controls (2nd ed.)
Russcol, Herbert. The Liberation of Sound
Schwartz, Elliot. A Listener's Guide to Electronic Music

Periodicals of interest: Computer Music Journal, Organized Sound, Electronic Musician, Keyboard Magazine, EQ Magazine, MIX Magazine.

Prof. Jeffrey Hass [email]