The Vitale Digital Media Lab offers training, equipment, and knowledgeable staff to help the Penn community with digital media projects, including video, audio, image editing/scanning, graphic design, and web publishing. Use our computer lab or recording studio, borrow equipment for your own use, or attend a workshop to learn a new skill! Lab resources are available to all current Penn students, faculty, and staff.
Browse and reserve equipment
The Vitale Digital Media Lab is located on the first floor of the Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center. As you enter Van Pelt Library, walk through the turnstiles, continue straight past the elevators, and turn left. Walk down the hallway to the far west end of the building. Vitale will be on your right.
The studio is located on the third floor of the Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center. To find us, walk through the turnstiles and take one of the elevators on your left to the third floor. Turn left when you step out of the elevator, then make the first left past the elevators. The studio is the second door on the right, directly across from the photocopy area.
In Vitale you can design a poster or flier, edit video or audio, scan and print documents, convert old media, and more! Not sure how to use a piece of software or equipment? Just check with one of our consultants.
You can also borrow cameras, audio equipment, gaming and VR devices, projectors, and related accessories to use outside Vitale. See everything we have available.
No; we are a self-service lab. But we will show you how to get your project done and teach you to use any necessary software.
We charge for poster printing. Otherwise, our services come at no additional cost you.
If you return equipment late, you will be charged a late fee.
We do not reserve workstations for individuals. The machines in the lab are available on a first-come, first-served basis. Faculty who are interested in using the lab for their class should contact the lab coordinator.
You are welcome to connect your own mp3 player, earphones, flash/thumb drive, external hard drive, or graphics tablet to our workstations. Please ask about other devices.
Find the list of available software on this page under "Equipment and Software."
The lab is aimed at helping people accomplish specific tasks. To this end, we can help you learn how to use specific pieces of software to accomplish those tasks and are available in the lab to answer specific questions. Some pieces of software (Photoshop and Final Cut Pro are good examples) are enormously complicated and we simply don't have the resources to teach you to use them in an in-depth way. We highly recommend using the online courses available to Penn users via Linked-in Learning to learn this software.
We periodically offer introductory workshops for specific pieces of software. See our event calendar for more.
We cannot install a piece of commercial software on the workstations in the lab unless we have purchased a license for it. If you have purchased a piece of software, we cannot install it on our machines for you and then uninstall it when you leave. If there is a piece of free software you would like to install, please ask us and we will let you know if it's possible.
We do sometimes add software to the machines in the lab based on user requests. Please let us know if you have any suggestions for other additions to make to the lab.
We cannot install a font that you purchased on the lab machines. If there is a free font you need to use, ask us and we will let you know if it's possible.
Yes, especially if you need help working on your project or if you need to import video footage to your computer. The Libraries also have several comfortable study spaces you may want to check out .
No. We aren't able to fix your computer for you. If you truly think your computer is broken and rebooting the machine doesn't fix the problem, the University Tech Center may be able to help.
We can import audio/video to our workstations from the following sources:
We do NOT have equipment in the lab to import:
If you bring your own camera or video/video deck that has an S-Video or RCA output, we can most likely patch it into our system and allow you to import your video to edit.
If you do not see a format specifically mentioned above, please ask us.
Need motivation to study? Join our monthly Community Study Sessions — a relaxed, supportive space to stay focused, meet others, and enjoy free snacks.
Fill out our consultation form to request assistance for workshops, collaboration at events, or assistance related to our equipment and software.
Fill out our formWe are currently recruiting for the Holsley Digital Literacy Fellowship. This program encourages creative exploration of technologies commonly used in our rapidly evolving 21st century workplace and beyond.
Learn more and applyCall the Vitale Digital Media Lab at 215-746-2661 or get in touch with one of our team members.
