"The Digital Media Capstone is an immersive course designed to support your journey to finishing your capstone through peer review, community, and reflection. We will be doing a lot of designing, building, planning, reflection, rebuilding…and hopefully have fun while we do it. My hope is that you will emerge from the capstone process with a project that can serve you and your aspirations and a community that will nurture those aspirations for years to come."
Karina Lin-Murphy
"I appreciate the opportunity to work closely with every student in my capstone course and to support them in realizing the creative and expressive potential of computation in their projects. "
Bakhtiar Mikhak
Overview
The capstone course provides you with the preparation for and the opportunity to complete a digital media design project related to your professional interests. Your capstone will have a main focus of (1) web and mobile applications (2) animation, film, or virtual reality, (3) instructional design, or (4) emerging media and technology. Whatever focus you choose, you must have taken more than four courses in the area of your capstone track before enrolling in the precapstone course to prepare yourself for successful completion of your capstone project.
About the Precapstone
The capstone course for Digital Media Design, DGMD E-599 (offered in the fall and spring terms) directly follows the precapstone course, DGMD 597 (offered in both summer and fall terms).
In the precapstone course you will develop an academically strong, individual or team-based capstone proposal through workshopping, collaboration, research, and working with industry partners. You will receive guidance on refining project proposals, building the domain knowledge necessary in your selected area, and conducting user research. By the end of the course, as an individual or as a team, you will submit a detailed capstone proposal, including project rationale, literature reviews, scope, target audience/user journeys, timeline, and competitor analysis.
Upon successful completion of the precapstone, you enroll in the capstone as your final, one-and-only remaining course. Due to the heavy demands of the capstone is considered a full-time course. All other degree requirements must be fulfilled so you can draw upon your entire ALM training to produce a final project worthy of a Harvard degree.
Prerequisites
DGMD 597 Digital Media Design Precapstone
Students must officially admitted degree candidates in the Master of Liberal Arts (ALM), digital media design and in their penultimate semester. Prospective candidates and students with pending admission applications are not eligible. Candidates must be in good academic standing and in the process of successfully completing all degree requirements, except the capstone, which they must enroll in the upcoming fall or spring term as their final, one-and-only course.
DGMD E-599 Digital Media Design Capstone
Registration in the DGMD E-599 Digital Media Design Capstone is limited to officially admitted candidates in the Master of Liberal Arts, digital media design. Candidates must be in good academic standing, ready to graduate with only the capstone left to complete (no other course registration is allowed simultaneously with the capstone), and have successfully completed DGMD S-597 (in the previous summer term) or DGMD E-597 (in the previous fall term). Candidates who do not meet these requirements are dropped from the course.
Faculty
Bakhtiar Mikhak, PhD
Co-Founder, Media Modifications, Ltd.
Karina Lin-Murphy, EdM
Manager of Faculty Development, Division of Continuing Education, Harvard University
Alexandra Seckar-Bandow, BA, ALM
Video Editor, Verse Video Education
Course Links
Digital Media Design Precapstone (DGMD E-597)
Capstone Design Studio (DGMD E-599)