For graduate student Lauren Peak, it all began with an e-mail about a student immersion program that was sent out in October.
"I just happened to read that one," she said with a chuckle. Now she is the co-executive producer of "Evenly Odd," a webisode that premiered Monday at the Digital Exchange Showcase.
The Center for Media Design held its first showcase of the week in the Art and Journalism Building to show students what the program's different parts has done.
Suzanne Plesha, associate director for Center for Media Design, said the showcases were important because the CMD did not belong to a college, so it was hard to tell students about what the center was doing.
"This is the one time of the year that we have an opportunity to show people what content were producing and what research were doing," she said.
She said people in the CMD were always hoping people stopped by and interacted with the media on display.
Michael Chandler, a junior directing and digital media major, said creating the webisode "Evenly Odd" had been a great way to learn about the future of the industry.
"Evenly Odd" is about a group of first-year college students who find a common bond through their experiences.
Chandler said the shift in the entertainment industry was to present information online on webisodes and mobisodes and using the Internet as a usable medium.
"[We're not] following [the industry] as much as keeping up with the front edge of the emerging trends of the industry right now," he said.
Co-executive producer Chandler said not a lot of people were presenting content on webisodes and mobisodes because companies did not know how to market it effectively.
The immersion activity would give students in the project an opportunity to set a standard for Internet entertainment, he said.
Chandler said three teams of students worked on marketing to business, making the episodes and creating behind the scenes footage to be seen on the Web site.
Three or four different directors from Los Angeles came down and helped during the production of the webisodes, he said, but they also were recruiting students who had knowledge of this new form of distribution.
Chandler said the directors guaranteed most of the students involved with the project would be able to get an internship because of their experiences.
"It is not just a regular student film, it's been taken up a notch," he said.
Chandler said the marketing team received donations from local businesses from Indianapolis and Muncie, but hoped to get national exposure for the webisode. He said the team would use advertising from Craig Murry Productions and were working toward an agreement with Virgin Records.
Chandler said he hoped the webisode started small within the Ball State University community and the news would begin to spread to other universities such as Indiana and Purdue universities.
"We are hoping to use Ball State as a jump start," he said.
The webisode would be posted at the end of the semester of the summer and new episodes would premiere every week, he said.
Peak said it was a great learning experience creating a webisode series. He said they were doing a lot more than just a show.
The immersion experience was something students shouldn't pass up because it would give them a chance to work with professionals and learn about the process, he said.
The CMD consists of five different organizations such as the Institute for Digital entertainment and Education, the Institute for Digital Intermedia, the Arts and Animation, the Insight and Research, the Institute for Digital Fabrication and the Digital Corps.
Center of Media Design's Digital Showcase Schedule
Tuesday:Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts and Animation
Wednesday:Insight and Research
Thursday:Institute for Digital Fabrication
Friday:Digital Corps
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