Creative Multimedia and Digital Marketing

The fields of creative multimedia programming and online marketing are closely related. Many creative multimedia projects are in fact used to promote the product of the creator, while also being the product. Viral marketing has become a huge phenomenon in recent years, and the skills learned in creative multimedia programming are very much transferable to this area. Indeed, it can be very simple to start off, by using a blog such as this or a Facebook page. Search engine optimisation is very important for this type of marketing as well; the more hits you get on Google and Bing, the more likely people are to look at your work, and the more likely you are to be successful.

Take, for example, Miranda Manning. Manning is an emerging author who has recently published her first book, Who is Alice?, through Poolbeg Press. Manning set up a Facebook page to market her work online, and received 50 fans in the space of a few days, using her own network. As her work has never been published in book format before, this is quite an achievement. Her own statistics indicate that many of the views on her page were viral, in that the content was seen through the sharing actions of others.

In the image above, where you see the words '60 people saw this post', the administrator can hover over the words to see how many of these views were organic and how many were viral. It is a very effective marketing tool and should be used to the utmost.

To view Miranda Manning's Facebook page and 'like' it, click here:

Miranda Manning on Facebook

To read about her on the Poolbeg Press website, click here:

Miranda Manning at Poolbeg

Final Year Creative Multimedia Programming Project

Check out my Final Year Project blog for information on my major project for the H. Dip in Creative Multimedia Programming. I'm building an online museum using Unity 3D. I modelled my objects in 3ds max and brought them in to a terrain I created using Unity. I have yet to add scripting to the project, but you can see my work in progress here:

Creative Multimedia Programming - Online Museum

Creative Multimedia Programming and database systems

Good database design is vitally important to a successful creative multimedia project. Data may be stored in the database and called using the PHP programming language in order to create dynamic content and minimise site maintenance. With a dynamic PHP database, the owner of the website can update it without the help of webmaster, which is essential for any business.

Good database design ensures readability and usability in your creative multimedia project.

Programming for Creative Multimedia Projects

Programming can often be a challenge for those starting from scratch with creative multimedia. Many find it difficult to integrate left-brain and right-brain thinking, as most of us are dominated by one side of the brain or the other. However, with lots of practice, it's possible to create dynamic content which can be styled creatively at the front end. It is fundamental to multimedia to be able to combine the logical with the creative. However, often in industry these roles are separate, with programmers doing the back end and designers maintaining the front end. However, it is very important to understand the dialogue between these two for a successful multimedia project.