Award-winning Journalist Carol Marin to Partner with Center on Documentary Project

DePaul University has converted 25,000 square feet of space on its Lincoln Park Campus into two Digital Media Centers (DMC) that rival the most advanced film and video production houses in the country. In keeping with its aim to better serve students’ academic needs, the centers will house the DePaul Documentary Project, a professional production facility to be run by award-winning broadcast journalist Carol Marin.

According to Michael L. Mezey, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the centers will allow a broad spectrum of university curricula to apply advanced digital technology as a new medium of creative expression. “Digital media simultaneously offers remarkable possibilities for independent audio-visual communication and presents a series of complex questions regarding the nature of artistic expression and its place and role in society,” said Mezey.

The centers are located on the fifth floor of the Schmitt Academic Center (SAC), 2320 N. Kenmore Ave, and on the third floor of the new Student Center, 2250 N. Sheffield Ave.The 10,000-square foot center housed in SAC is used primarily as an editing laboratory that includes private sound-proof editing suites for advanced student projects. It also includes classroom space. The center in the Student Center encompasses 15,000 square feet and is broken down into the following workspaces:

Two labs with digital editing and graphic stations

Two television news studios (an anchor room and a reporting studio with virtual capability)

A state-of-the-art motion capture stage

An advanced sound mixing/recording studio

A high-tech classroom with 30 wireless PC tablet stations

The university invested close to $500,000 dollars in digital production equipment alone, including eight, top-of-the-line Canon XL1-S cameras.

The DMCs opened in the 2002 fall quarter and have offered cross-listed courses to support a number of academic areas, including art and art history, communication, music, theater and computer science telecommunications and information systems. A sample of the courses that can be offered using the interdisciplinary approach include: Film/Video Production I&II, Multimedia Techniques, Digital Animation, Digital Editing, Concepts in Media Design, Film History, Film Aesthetics, Documentary Production, Sound Design for Film/Video, Music for Film/Video, Directing for Film/Video, Screenwriting, and Sound Design for Film and Video.

“Offering these courses in an interdisciplinary setting enriches students’ experiences by providing different perspectives that help to broaden their knowledge, understanding and context for the courses,” said Matt Irvine, director of the Digital Media Centers.

Students will be further enriched by the DePaul Documentary Project (DDP), which offers the first professional documentary center within a Chicago university. The centers serve as the central office and production house for the television news/documentary team of Marin and Don Moseley (Marin Corp. Productions), which will continue to produce long- and short-form broadcast journalism for both public and commercial broadcast.

There are several university documentary programs across the country, but the DDP is one of the few that is headed by award-winning media professionals who deal directly with the media world. Marin and Moseley have been awarded two Peabody Awards, two National Emmys and are the recent recipients of a Grace Award from American Women in Radio and Television, to name a few. Marin and Moseley have been a correspondent and production team for more than 20 years. Their work has appeared nationally on 60 Minutes, 60 Minutes II, 48 Hours, The CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, the Today Show and in Chicago on WMAQ-TV and WBBM-TV. Marin is currently a columnist for the editorial pages of the Chicago Tribune.

The mission of the DDP, according to Mezey, is to provide DePaul students with exceptional communication internship opportunities by producing documentaries. “We are very fortunate to include this award-winning journalism team among our valuable resources here at DePaul,” said Mezey. “The DePaul Documentary Project will give students firsthand experience with the best in the business and give Marin and Moseley a fully functional facility in which to create their work.”

Interns working on the DDP will be involved with the program for an entire academic year and will be drawn from the Communication Department. They will be involved in every aspect of the production process, including pre-production of new projects, production crew and distribution of finished films.

“The pieces produced by Marin and Moseley consistently address issues of justice, equity, understanding, truth and human worth,” said Mezey. “As such, their work is consonant with the Vincentian and urban mission of DePaul. By working in the DDP, students will not only better understand the business of the professional media world but will learn how powerful communication skills and tools can be in the service of communities.”