Buoyancy as illustrated by Lauren Novotny and Tyler Ostrovsky, 2009

This class, VAST 217, is a sophomore-level seminar course in the Art & Science of Flow Visualization.  I developed and team teach it with Karina Skvirsky in the Lafayette College Art Department.  Although inspired by Jean Herzberg’s and Alex Sweetman’s course at the University of Colorado, Karina and I departed significantly from their model, beginning with our audience of liberal arts sophomores who have not yet declared their intended majors.   We endeavor to show them the beauty of fluid mechanics, to teach them the fundamental flow physics and the history of flow visualization, and to train them to make their own photographs illustrating fluid mechanics concepts.  There are readings in fluid dynamics and art history, and this is a writing-intensive [W] course.  Our class is offered with Lafayette’s VAST course designation.

You can read the paper I presented about this course at the 2010 FIE meeting here.  Lafayette’s Communications department also made a lovely video about the first offering of the course.