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Interactive Media Design

Franklin University Interactive Media Design degree program banner Program OverviewProgram DetailsWhy Choose Franklin

Deliver innovative interactive, instructional, and mobile solutions to the world

From gaming to mobile apps to websites, and from entertainment to productivity to instruction, interactive solutions come in all forms. Whatever your passion, a bachelor’s degree with a major in Interactive Media Design from Franklin University can help you harness the technical, artistic, and management aspects of this dynamic career to maximum impact.

From needs analysis to deployment, Franklin’s Interactive Media Design (IMD) degree completion program equips you to deliver interactive solutions throughout the entire development lifecycle. Unlike some programs, Franklin’s IMD major exposes you to both the technical and non-technical aspects of interactive development. From mobile, graphic, rich media, web, and interaction design to front-end development, our program combines project management expertise with solid design and technology skills.

Transfer up to 24 technical credits or 84 semester hours

Because Franklin University’s program is specifically designed for transfer students, if you’ve taken interactive media, 3D graphics, or visual communication courses, you can transfer 24 technical credits or up to 84 semester hours toward your Interactive Media Design Major.

Here, you’ll learn what it takes to work with high-performing interactive teams. Our degree program offers hands-on, project-based instruction, and focuses on helping you apply your existing technical skills within high-growth career segments such as training, advertising, and entertainment.

Sharpen your skills with industry-standard software and technologies

At Franklin, you’ll also hone your design and development skills using popular software and technologies, such as Adobe® Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash, HTML, CSS, and Javascript to create a variety of interactive solutions, including mobile interfaces for iPhone® and Android®.

This program’s practicum simulates an actual design firm with the instructor as the organizational leader and students like you filling other critical roles. Throughout, you’ll collaborate on the design and development of interactive solutions for practical, real-world problems.

Create a professional portfolio to showcase your work

You’ll emerge from the major with a professional portfolio of work created for actual clients, along with ample experience collaborating with design teams. Your Franklin education will open up potential career advancement opportunities with advertising agencies, web design firms, and corporations with internal design departments.

Top industry professionals evaluate and influence our program continually, and our faculty teach industry best practices based on their own successful careers designing and leading interactive teams.

Earn your degree from a university built for busy adults

Earn your degree on your terms by taking classes 100% online or pursue available coursework at one of our eleven Midwest locations. Regionally accredited and nonprofit, Franklin was built from the ground-up to satisfy the needs of adult learners. Our seamless transfer process and team of academic advisors will help ease your transition to becoming a student, while our flexible course schedules help to balance your education with work, family, and life. Get started on your future today!

Gain The Skills Employers Desire

  • Graphic Design
    • Turn creative vision into visual concepts and compelling design, employing industry design standards and best practices
    • Create design mockups and comps, adhering to brand guidelines and brand positioning
    • Use Adobe® Photoshop, Illustrator, and similar software to create visual assets with a pixel-level attention to detail
    • Design web, mobile, and social assets, organizing layout, typography, color palettes, and imagery into highly functional and aesthetically pleasing user experiences
    • Source and select photos to effectively illustrate company and product stories
  • Web Design
    • Design and implement web interfaces, including concepts, layout, and selection of appropriate illustrative assets
    • Improve visual aesthetics and functionality by optimizing design concepts for development with HTML/CSS
    • Conceptualize and create intuitive, engaging, and brand-consistent interactive user experiences across a variety of platforms
    • Translate business, training, and marketing objectives into engaging, interactive visual solutions through the use of thoughtful typography, digital media, color, imagery, and hierarchy
  • Rich Media
    • Use assets, mockups, and storyboards to interpret creative vision and develop engaging rich media ad concepts
    • Design and develop HTML/HTML5, CSS, and JavaScript-based rich media projects
    • Create Flash animations and special effects for objects and characters with timelines and ActionScript
    • Apply basic and advanced Flash animation techniques, such as tweening, display properties, effects, and motion
  • Mobile Design
    • Create mobile user interfaces and mobile sites for iPhone®, Android®, and other smart phones, ensuring quality delivery of code and design artifacts
    • Engage mobile users through the thoughtful application and translation of interactive media into comprehensive mobile strategies
    • Generate elegant, innovative design solutions for cutting-edge mobile and web applications
    • Design compelling, functional, and desirable user experiences and interfaces for a variety of mobile apps, leveraging user interface (UI) artifacts inherent in each device
  • Interaction Design
    • Devise intuitive interactions that create interface environments free from cognitive barriers while ensuring desired outcomes
    • Use wireframes, mind maps, and storyboards to design and demonstrate interactive models
    • Design engaging interactions for multiple platforms that leverage user characteristics and application goals
  • Concepting
    • Participate in or lead creative brainstorming sessions, resulting in new themes and fresh concepts
    • Employ conceptual thinking, visual and verbal storytelling, typography, iconography, color theory, proportion, and layout in the execution of concepts and strategies
    • Present design and copy concepts to key stakeholders, including leadership, project teams, and clients
    • Analyze the business, marketing, instructional, or entertainment challenge or opportunity, and author a creative approach to executing relevant solutions and programs
    • Collaborate with project or brand teams, UX designers, and programmers in the development of strategic approaches and creative concepts
    • Translate business strategies and marketing objectives into compelling, creative concepts
  • Project Management
    • Drive project teams toward exceeding client expectations with the successful completion of project deliverables within scope, time, budget, and requirements
    • Use input from key stakeholders, vendors, and partners to prepare requirements documentation, project plans, timelines, budget, and resource allocation plans
    • Lead functional requirements-gathering sessions, creating user requirements and/or functional specification documents such as site maps, wireframes, user flows, use cases, and other business logic documentation
    • Create and facilitate accurate project plans featuring clearly defined milestones, deliverables, and tasks

Career Opportunities

  • Interactive Designer

    Interactive Designers collaborate in the creation of digital experiences by recommending ways to design the experience that bridge the gap between human need and computer capability.

    View Salary Trends
  • Interactive Media Designer

    Interactive Media Designers integrate audio, video, animation, graphics, and other multimedia components into technology-based, consumable media such as CDs, DVDs, websites, TV, and movies.

    View Salary Trends
  • Interface Designer

    Interface Designers employ visual design, creative, and marketing skills to make applications both understandable and appealing to users.

    View Salary Trends
  • Instructional Designer

    Instructional Designers create online and software-based educational and training materials to teach a topic, subject, or course of study.

    View Salary Trends
  • Media Designer

    Media Designers conceive and create marketing, advertising, sales, and product materials in order to inform, educate, or entertain an intended audience.

    View Salary Trends
  • Mobile Application Designer

    Mobile Application Designers design and develop technology programs, games and tools for hand-held devices such as cell phones, iPads, and personal digital assistants.

    View Salary Trends
  • Social Media Specialist

    Social Media Specialists leverage social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter on behalf of clients and/or companies to create, maintain and/or grow a following to maximize engagement with the organization, product, service, or brand.

    View Salary Trends
  • Web Designer/Developer

    Web Designers/Developers translate business objectives into interactive, web-based content and experiences that communicate information about an organization and/or its products and services.

    View Salary Trends

Employment Outlook

From 2010-2020 jobs in Interactive Media Design are expected to increase by 15%. Jobs in Interactive Media Design are estimated to grow from 1.6 million to 1.8 million by 2020.

Source information provided by Economic Modeling Specialists International (EMSI)

Our Recipe For Your Success

Academic & Industry Experts

Classes are taught and designed by credentialed professionals with real-world experience.
 

  • Programs are designed by combining the insight of industry leaders with the academic expertise of our faculty, ensuring what you learn translates into on-the-job success.

  • Academic concepts and theories are brought to life through our teaching faculty’s professional expertise, and can be immediately applied in your career.

  • Faculty with industry experience teach our courses, not graduate students or life-time academics, so you learn not only the theories behind the practice but also how to apply them in real-world situations.

Relevant & Consistent Curriculum

What you learn is a reflection of the program you choose, not the format in which it’s applied.
 

  • All programs are designed for learning outcomes to flow from the program level into actual coursework.

  • This top-down approach allows credentialed professionals to customize assignments based on trending industry topics without deviating from a program’s core outcomes.

  • Regardless of your professor or the format of your class, you receive the same quality education.

Hands-On Learning Experience

Franklin's coursework teaches not only theories and concepts, but also how they apply to practical situations.

 

  • Professional course designers ensure that class activities such as learning simulations, case studies, interactive videos, and group exercises are relevant and appropriate.

  • A curriculum development team is dedicated to making sure all courses are intuitively designed so content is taught in a logical manner that facilitates your success in the classroom and beyond.

Continuously Evolving Programs

Consistent program reviews ensure our programs stay at the forefront of industry trends.
 

  • Survey results and feedback from student and faculty assessments are reviewed regularly so that our programs are always improving and up-to-date.

  • A structured review process helps identify industry gaps that guide curriculum enhancements allowing our academic and industry experts to regularly implement new industry trends.

  • Regular assessment provides hard data that is used to improve student learning and teaching methods.

Get the details

Read course descriptions, learn about degree options, and meet program faculty.

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