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Digital communication requires a computer and a screen in order to present the document.
Digital communication involves creating documents and files and then 'displaying' them via a computer and a screen.
Advantages/Disadvantages of digital-based communication are summarised below:
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Digital communication gives the user an interactive experience with sound, video and click able areas |
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- Far cheaper as there is no printing.
- Exciting effects can be added (animation, sound video etc).
- Easier to update content.
- Communication can be interactive (viewer can click options or leave comments etc)
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- Often requires expensive software.
- Some software is very difficult to use (music production, website design etc).
- More complex documents require more time to build.
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| Examples of digital communication |
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Examples of digital communication are listed below:
- Websites
- Multimedia Presentations
- Music Scores
- Cartoons
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Websites are made up of a collection of web-pages and can contain a wide variety of content. For example:
- Text
- Images
- Sound
- Animation
- Video
- Click able areas like hyperlinks
- User Interactivity (comment boxes, forums etc)
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NASA online communicates news to us via
multimedia content like videos, images, text and sound
(Click image to visit the website) |
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NOTE!
When the world wide web was invented in 1991, early websites did not include much multimedia at all. They were only capable of basic text and images.
The image below shows you the first web page ever created:
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(Click the image to visit the world's first web page) |
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Many companies choose to advertise their products on websites rather than on paper-based documents (like posters). This is because websites can be easily accessed by millions and millions of people.
Imagine the costs of printing millions and millions of posters!!
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Modern websites include lots of multimedia content like streaming video, sound and animation. This makes communicating information over websites a much more interesting experience. |
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Advantages/Disadvantages of communicating over websites are summarised below:
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- Multimedia content can be added (sound, video etc).
- Web Pages can be created or updated and then published at no extra cost (no printing for example).
- The content is accessible to literally millions of people at any time.
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- You need a computer or portable device to view the website (expensive).
- You need an Internet connection in order to view the website. (Internet connections can go down)
- You need specialist training in order to build the website.
- Websites can be hacked or become infected with viruses.
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'Multimedia' is the term given to documents/software that contain combinations of:
- Text
- Images
- Animations
- Sound/Music
- Video
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Interactive encyclopedia's use multimedia to bring topics to life and make learning fun |
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Documents that make use of multimedia are much more interesting than paper-based documents that cannot make use of multimedia. |
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Multimedia presentations are often used in education because they 'bring subjects to life' which helps to make learning fun.
Old printed text books that cannot use multimedia can become very dull and boring if you study from them for too long!
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Advantages/Disadvantages of communicating over multimedia presentations are summarised below:
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- Sound, animations and video can be used.
- Make topics more interesting and helps hold the user's attention.
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- You need a computer to view the presentation (expensive).
- Software needed to create the presentation can be expensive.
- Specialist training may be needed in order to build the presentation.
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Music can now be composed and edited on a computer using special hardware/software.
Methods include the following:
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Music editors allow us to enhance sounds with different effects or edit tempo, pitch etc |
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A guitar connected to a laptop via MIDI. This allows notes created by the guitar to be recorded and edited |
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Sequencers |
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Used to create musical sounds like drum beats.
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Sound Wave Editors |
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Allow music/sound to be edited and modified (e.g. raise tempo, add effects etc)
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MIDI |
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MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) allows musical instruments to be plugged into a computer.
Analogue data from the instrument is converted into digital data by an ADC.
Once in the computer, the digital music can be edited and stored.
The computer can re-send the digital music back to the instrument using DAC to convert to analogue. The instrument (keyboard for example) could then play the edited music back.
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Digital Music Notators |
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This software allows us to compose music on a computer rather than writing notes by hand. Notes can be entered by:
- Typing them into the software
- Input via MIDI
- Scanned in from existing paper-based notes
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Music does not need to be written by hand anymore |
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Digital Music Notators allow music to be
composed on a computer |
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Cartoon development has changed a lot with the introduction of ICT.
Old cartoons used to have to be drawn by hand frame-by-frame. Every tiny movement of a character or object had to be drawn. Lighting and fine detail was also added by hand. This was a hugely time consuming process.
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An original-hand drawn cartoon frame from Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs |
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Computers can hugely speed up this process by using 3-D models which are made up of mathematical polygons.
Special software can be used to add the following to the 3-D model:
- Textures - adding skin, clothes etc
- Poses - positioning the model into different shapes across frames
- Effects - adding lighting, shadows etc
- Animation - combining each frame to simulate movement.
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3-D model created on a computer |
Pixar's Wall-E 3-D model with and without textures |
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NOTE!
You can use simple animation software to create your own cartoons on your computer at home.
'Flash' is a popular option and it allows you to use Key Frames and a technique called Tweening to make objects move.
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