Michael Just Back After 14 Years

Today we had a very special guest. The first ever exchange student we had in the School of Art and Media, Michael Just from FH Furtwangen in Germany paid a visit.

Michael (or Mike) made a tour in our premises. Back in 1995 when Mike did his exchange our school was in 5 different buildings in the Finlayson area. He admired our new (since 2000) site, but told he could identify the same creative atmosphere as years back. What he especially enjoyed during his stay was the unique freedom of students to realize their ideas.

After his exchange in Tampere Mike did another exchange at Salford university, graduated from Furtwangen and made a diploma in education in Freiburg. Now he works with electronics, multimedia and education.

Mike made a one week holiday trip to meet his friends in Finland. Thanks Mike for visiting us, too. We will always remeber our first exchange student: you made our school bigger, started a process which led to the very international school we are today!

Picturised: Mike Just at our roof garden

Amir is the IMP Mölkky Champion 2009

The first TAMK international Media Programme students' third orientation day on Friday included a meeting with the study office staff and lecturers followed by presentations of School of Art and Media student club Tarina and Game Development Club Score.
In the afternoon IMP visited Demola, and the orientation was rounded up with IMP 2009 Mölkky Championship tournament.
Tarina
Score
Demola is the innovation space of the unversities and companies at Finlayson. The Media Programme students will work in projects here, some of them will also create their final thesis project in this environment.
Demola
More on Demola in this blog

Mölkky is a popular Finnish throwing game. The IMP Mölkky Champion 2009 is Amir from Iran. This was his first Mölkky experience.
Mölkky

Next chance to join IMP, the Degree Programme in Media is in January. You will find information about the application process in this blog by the end of September.

IMPs are students of the Degree Programme in Media of TAMK School of Art and Media (Interactive/International Media Programme)
More stories about IMPs
Media Programme home

Start Today: This is the Degree Programme in Media

The new international BA programme at TAMK School of Art and Media, the Degree Programme in Media started today. The first day and a half the students orientate at TAMK University of Applied Sciences main campus at Teiskontie, tomorrow afternoon Media Programme students move to the home of the programme at Finlayson in the city center.

The first assignment of the group was to illustrate itself. All students and the tutors introduced themselves giving key-words for their hobbies and interests, areas of expertise and dream jobs.

You can see the result on right in the tag cloud generated with the help of Wordle.

You will read more about the new programme and students soon again!

http://www.wordle.net/

IMPs are students of the Degree Programme in Media of TAMK School of Art and Media (Interactive/International Media Programme)
More stories about IMPs
Media Programme home

Guerilla Lighting Comes to Tampere

GUERRILLA LIGHTING
TAMPERE 17.9.2009 at 20:00
Frenckell

A Guerrilla Lighting event will be organized for the first time in Tampere this autumn. This urban method from England uses concrete examples to raise discussion on exterior lighting. It is an event in which a group of citizens follows a predetermined plan to “invade” the streets with powerful torches. The starting point of the guerrilla march is from the main entrance of Frenckell office building on September 17th at 20:00.

The objective of Guerrilla Lighting event is to raise discussion on city lighting. Young lighting design students from TAMK School of Art and Media have selected four targets for illumination in Tampere and also made designs for each one. The illuminations are implemented as temporary and with large rechargeable torches.

The British consultancy firm BDP has carried out the project in Glasgow and London, among other places, and directed the first Guerrilla Lighting event in Finland last year. “Guerrilla Lighting gives a chance to be players in a live lighting design created by up and coming young Finnish lighting designers. It also creates a platform to talk about professional lighting design as the key to sustainable lighting design and participate in the war on bad lighting” says Martin Lupton, BDP Director of Lighting

The event proceeds so that first the previously enrolled people (about 50 persons) are instructed for the mission. Then the marchers start moving on with torches, colour filters and small LED lights and they light up the selected sites one by one. Once a signal is heard, the torches are switched on and for one moment the target is illuminated in an impressive manner. The illuminations are photographed and the images delivered to the media immediately after the event. Anyone interested is welcomed to join the march.

The organizers of the event wishes to make the citizens and media pay attention to the lighting of a city environment with the help of Guerrilla Lighting. At the same time the architectural masterpieces in the city are shown in a new light. The examples are there to remind that with quality lighting it is possible to reach a comfortable and secure city environment, and that the implementation can be at the same time impressive and energy-efficient. Guerrilla team also promotes architectural lighting design as a profession and an important field of urban planning.

Guerrilla Lighting Event is organized by lighting design students from TAMK School of Art and Media, headed by lighting designer BA Annukka Larsen. Event is organized in co-operation with Super Mukava design store and it is a part of a new DesignOnTampere –happening (11.-20.9.2009).

Timetable:
Tampere, September 17th, starting from the front of Frenckell office building on Central Square at 20:00. The walk around the sites takes about 1,5 hours. Information about the after party to follow.

If you wish to be one of the marchers to illuminate the sites, please, enrol to anna@mukava.net (latest on 16th September).

Story by Annukka Larsen

Guerrilla Lighting –events
Video
Pictures

DesignOnTampere –happening
Blog

The Exchange Students Arrived

TAMK University of Applied Sciences hosts this autumn 87 exchange students from 19 countries. They started this week doing a three day orientation period, next week they join the regular students in the degree programmes.

TAMK School of Art and Media exchange students come this semester from Estonia, Malaysia, Czech Republic, Netherlands, Canada and Spain.

The first year students of TAMK international degree programmes taught in English start their orientation period next week. Degree Programme in Media is a new bachelor's programme at TAMK School of Art and Media, run totally in English.

Last night our first year students of degree programmes in Fine Art and Film and Television arranged a get-together party, inviting our international groups to join.

Pictured: A group of our exchange students, Media Programme students and student tutors crossing Tammerkoski rapids on their way to the get-together party

Demola New Year Begins

Demola is the joint innovation space for companies and the four universities in Tampere. You can find Demola close to TAMK School of Art and Media at Finlayson in the heart of Tampere.

Companies have more project ideas than time to test them. Companies give their ideas to Demola, where Demola student teams start to process them, and create a demo over a few months, an application, a service or something else.

Companies are not allowed to give any routine tasks like company web site design to Demola. The assignments are always about innovating something new. When the project is over, the students keep the intellectual property rights of the results, but the companies can claim rights to use it by paying to students.

Students benefit from working at Demola, because they can apply their know-how and skills in real world innovative projects, and they can earn money in addition to gaining university credits. Working in multi-disciplinary teams is very useful, and while one third of Demola students are exchange students or studying in an international degree programme, the students also learn to work in international teams.

Demola kick-off was one year ago, but it really started working in January. During the first year 30 projects were initialized, and ten of them have already come to an end, all claimed by companies. Most of the ongoing projects are finished within a couple of weeks.

There has been 157 student innovators, and ten of them have already been hired by the company partners. Additionally 20 students got a summer-job at Demola.

The second year is about to begin, and already 40 new projects are waiting.

Demola community
Previous posts on Demola (12)

Photo: Professors and lecturers of the four universities met at Demola to discuss the further development of Demola. The students teams presented their projects

Welcome New Year, Welcome New Degree Programmes!

The new academic year of TAMK University of Applied Sciences is about to begin. The lecturers and other staff members have worked hard to have everything prepared. The most exciting development this year is the merger of TAMK and PIRAMK UAS on January 1st. Last Tuesday the staff members of both merging universities gathered to a joint staff meeting, and had a massive get-together party in the evening. New friends and lots of fun.

TAMK School of Art and Media welcomes students of two new BA degree programmes, the Film and Television Programme which is taught in Finnish and the Media Programme run in English. The Media Programme focuses on visual design and interactive media.

The student groups begin their studies:

• August 18 the first year students of Fine Arts + Film and Television
• August 19 exchange students
• August 24 second year and higher students of Fine Art and the Media Programme run in Finnish
• August 26 international Media Programme
• September 1 MA in Screenwriting

The Degree Programme in Media
The Degree Programme in Fine Arts
The Degree Programme in Film and Television
MA in Screenwriting

About TAMK-PIRAMK merger
Photo: TAMK School of Art and Media in center bacground

Rain Must Fall and The Electrician Invited to St.Petersburg

VIII Open St.Petersburg Student Film Festival "BEGINNING" will be held on September, 18 – 23, 2009 in St.Petersburg, Russia. The global contest of the festival invited again this year two films from TAMK School of Art and Media to be shown in the category for Fiction films.

The Electrician, directed by Miina Alajärvi, is the story of Marvin- an executioner in charge of the electric chair, who has to find a new way to use his unusual skill when he becomes unemployed.
The film is a co-production with Salford University, UK
The Electrician home
All posts about the Electrician

Rain Must Fall, directed by Anna-Kaisa "Niisku" Haapala: "When I was a child, I heard a story I wanted to hear over and over again. It was a fascinating story, because they said it was true." – Rain Must Fall will share that story with you.
Trailer with English subtitles

VIII Open St.Petersburg Student Film Festival «BEGINNING»

Tampere Art Factory 09 Online - Part Three

Our annual festival - Tampere Art Factory (TAF) - was in May, but much of the student works seen there are still visible online. In this part of the story we present the games and music videos and the contribution of the Dutch Academy of Popculture.

In the first part on July 29 films were presented, the second part August 4 presented fine art and animations.

Music videos

Of the music videos with lyrics in English shown at the TAF Lounge you can find online

Widescreenmode: Serotonin
Director Markus Aaltonen

I Was A Teenage Satan Worshipper: Boys Are Pigs
Director: Juha Kuoppala

Sole Convert: Desired Sadness Awaits
Director: Jussi Lindgren

Games

Our Game Development Club Score members presented Score and interactive media education in our school at Demola during TAF. The visitors could also play games developed by Score members.

Overboard
Villa Penguila
Unity

Score
Demola

Our first year students also presented their interactive projects at Demola, but they are all in Finnish.

Interactive VJ-show Nou & Herkauw

The days before TAF School of Art and Media had the International Week, with international workshops and seminars. Nou & Herkauw was the name of one of the workshops. It was lead by Adri Shokker from the Academy of Popculture, Netherlands. You can find a video presenting the result of the workshop, running at the opening reception of TAF. The video is made by the Academy of Popculture students who participated in the workshop.

Nou & Herkauw Workshop (Episode 3)

TAF promotion online

TAF 09 Photo Gallery
Kaisa Kukkonen and Sara Köteleki made the TAF Photo Gallery

TAF 09 commercial

TAF 09 Spot by Jaakko Kärnä (@Facebook)

*****
Photo: Overboard at Demolassa.
Photographer: Kaisa Kukkonen/Sara Köteleki
*****
Part one: Films
Part two: Fine Art and Animations
Part three: Music videos and games
All three parts on one page

There is more TAF online works in our blog in Finnish

Tampere Art Factory
More about TAF in this blog

Maria Kaurismäki's Sideline to Riga and Orivesi

Sideline, written and directed by Maria Kaurismäki, has been invited to Film Forum “Ecology of Soul” International Competition of debut&student shorts, August 23-27, 2009, Riga & Jurmala, Latvia and to Reikäreuna Film Festival September 9-13, Orivesi, Finland.

Sideline (Sivutyö) is a strong and topical story about a female student that drifts to be a prostitute. It’s a 13 minute short fiction movie, shot on 16mm film.

Sideline is the graduation work of Maria Kaurismäki at TAMK School of Art and Media.

Sideline has already been shown at:

• 6th edition of the Baltic Debuts Film Festival, July 2009 in Svetlogorsk (Kaliningrad region).
• Midnight Sun Film Festival, June 2009, Sodankylä, Finland
• 31st Moscow International Film Festival, June 2009
• KYKY, Berlin, April 29
• Kettupäivät, November 2008, Helsinki
• Tampere Art Factory, May 2008

Photo: Antti Reini and Krista Kosonen Photo by Ville Salminen

Sideline home (featuring trailer)
Sideline in this blog

Tampere Art Factory 09 Online - Part Two

Our annual festival - Tampere Art Factory (TAF) - was in May, but much of the student works seen there are still visible online. In this posting we present the fine art's students works and animations that were shown at TAF, which can be understood without knowledge of Finnish language.

In the first part of this story on July 29 films were presented, and in the third part music videos and games will be presented.

Diskurssidisko (Discourse Disco)

The graduation show of Fine Art students was presented at Art Centre Mältinranta and at Exhibition Centre TR1. The website of the exhibitions is only in Finnish, but some parts of it is online without language problems for audience not understanding Finnish:

Johanna Havimäki has published a collection of photos from the Mältinranta part

Henna Inkinen has published her graduation work, Adaption at her website. You can also find other experimental videos there.

The graduation work Adaption by Sanni Rajapolvi, Hera, has a website with the trailer of this experimental piece of video art.

The Mältinranta Art Centre has published a representative collection of pictures.

More Video by art students online

Timo Bredenberg's Video Installation Nights was exhibited at Tampere Railway Station.

The Video Performace Burn-In by Mikko Rantanen and Päivi Viinikainen was screened along with the films of media students, likewise the Experimental Video Suicidal Tendensies by Henna Inkinen.

Animations

Of the animations showed at the TAF Lounge, you can find three online:

Fish Lie
The surreal story follows a journey of a fish from ocean to ground.
Animation by Karoliina Paappa.
Music by Mikko Rantanen.

It Dwells in the Depths
In the depths of the seas lies a treasure...and a curse. This animation was awarded with 2nd prize at the Swan Lake Moving Image & Music Award 2008.
Animation: Hanne Zenjuga and Vesa Jokinen
Music: Kathryn Toyama

The Sink
The drunk Erkki comes home but won't find his keys, so he tries to get in another way which leads to a fatal consequence.
Team: Tuuli Juntunen, Kiira Kalliomäki, Tuomas Korolainen, Kaisa Kukkonen and Veera Niemi
*****
Picture from Nights
*****
Part one: Films
Part two: Fine Art and Animations
Part three: Music videos and games
All three parts on one page

There is more TAF online works in our blog in Finnish

Tampere Art Factory
More about TAF in this blog

The Swan Lake: Moving Image & Music Award deadline August 30

The Swan Lake: Moving Image & Music Award (SL:MIMA) invites young talented filmmakers to participate with a movie in one of the three categories: ’Computer-Animation’, ‘Digital Film’ and ‘Interactive Movie’. Modern piano music by international artists serves as the basis for the competition.

The participants download a piece of music composed by one of the supportive pianists and visualise it with an animated story, a digital film or an interactive movie.

The entries will be evaluated by a distinguished panel of jury members consisting of international experts within the fields of film and animation. The most impressive works will be awarded at the gala on October 20th, 2009 in Mittweida, Germany.

TAMK School of Art and Media is member of the SL:MIMA network, which has members in Slovakia, the UK, Hungary and South Africa. The main organiser is Mittweida University of Applied Sciences, Germany.

The group members of the experts supporting SL:MIMA are from Slovakia, USA, the UK, Hungary, Poland, Germany and Finland. One of the experts is Senior Lecturer Pertti Näränen from TAMK School of Art and Media.

Our school has been quite successful in this global contest:

In 2006 Risto-Pekka Blom won the Digital Film category with "Storm", music composed by Rebecca Kragnes.
Teemu Kutvonen got second prize with his animaation "One Donation, Three Lives", music by Guardner.
Helinä Hukkataival was nominated in the Digital Film category with "Silva", visualising Rauschfaktor's music.

In 2007 "Vahveraasio" was awarded with second prize in the animaation category and "Ystävyys" (Friendship) won third prize in digital film. The members of the Vahveraasio team were Juho Kepanen, Tuomas Kauppinen, Nina Riutta and Johanna Havimäki, music was composed by Blankenburg. Friendship was made by Raman Hussain to music by Rob Coslown.

Last year Vesa Jokinen and Hanne Zenjuga won second prize with their animation "It Dwells in the Depths", composition by Kathryn Toyama.

Swan Lake: Moving Image & Music Award
It Dwells in the Depths

SL:MIMA in this blog

Photo from "It Dwells in the Depths"