digital sparks

Student media project competition AND Talent Scout

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Digital Sparks Competition and Talent Scout

”digital sparks” is a competition for students and graduates of all disciplines whose work is linked to media art, media design, media IT and media communication. The objective is to find interactive, experimental and theoretical work which demonstrates an innovative approach to digital culture technologies.
The aim of the competition is to foster a new media-cultural generation and give an insight into research and teaching in media-cultural education in German-speaking higher education institutions.
[link 01] Video about "digital sparks" [RealMedia | 3 Min.]

Particular Characteristics

”digital sparks” is different from other competitions because higher education lecturers act as mentors commenting on their students entries within the context of their teaching. This presentation and the project descriptions show how lecturers and their students thematicise, research and reflect design and concepts in their work.
All entries are [link 02] published on netzspannung.org. This provides an audience for the work of students and their lecturers in the media environment and makes it available to interested parties from the fields of culture, education, business and science for purposes of viewing and [link 03] searching. The nominated projects including review-commentaries are documented in annual booklets for download (Sorry, German only). [link 04] 2001, [link 05] 2002, [link 06] 2003, [link 07] 2006, [link 08] 2008.

Prizes

In the context of the ”digital sparks” award the MARS-Exploratory Media Lab offers production grants of 2.500 Euro each for the best students. The winners are selected by an independent panel of judges, and are given the opportunity to present their work in front of an international audience of specialists.
The price winners of 2001-2003 and the production grants are documented in the digital sparks booklet (sorry, German only): screen-version [link 09] [PDF |2 MB], print-version [link 10] [PDF | 8,4 MB]

Organizer

The ”digital sparks” competition and talent scout is organised by the [link 11] MARS - Exploratory Media Lab of the [link 12] Fraunhofer Institute for Intelligent Analysis and Information Systems, and is presented on the netzspannung.org Internet platform for media art and electronic culture. In 2008 it is supported by the [link 13] German Federal Ministry for Education and Research and in 2006 the EU-Efre program.

Contact:
Monika Fleischmann, Wolfgang Strauss
[link 14] http://www.fleischmann-strauss.de/monika-fleischmann.html
[link 15] http://www.fleischmann-strauss.de/wolfgang-strauss.html
Fraunhofer IAIS
E-mail: info(AT)netzspannung.org