The statement that digital media is all made from the same "stuff" is intriguing. Being able to access the same material for construction and use it to create so many different products reminds me in many ways of how all matter is created. Protons, neutrons and electrons are all used to create these things called atoms which make up the different elements from which infinite combinations can be made. How wonderful that we now have such a tool to use in our quest to create! 

Being able to use, create and access digital media can have a profound impact on understanding for a student. Not only does digital media more closely represent how we interact with the world around us, but it can allow us a greater creative scope for learning about that world. Digital media lets us engage our eyes through text and video, our ears through sound. We can work through our creative processes quickly and with multiple iterations by simply moving around a few digits, lines of code or a command. Digital media, by its nature, can let us embrace multimodal literacy and meaning. 

While it is true that such meaning need not be constructed using digital media, the use of the digital can help the multimodal understanding of a concept blossom. We can use digital media such as animation to help us to build multimodal literacy or to grasp at understanding of a concept through multiple points of entry. The sound, images and movements that we see in an animation all bring in a different aspect to our understanding of a concept. Using such media to touch on the various modes to understanding can make it easier to grasp difficult concepts, such as protein sythesis. This video uses text, image, movement, and sound to illustrate how proteins are made inside a cell. Since the video was created using digital animation, all parts of the video are made of the same "stuff"--digital media.

https://creatingmultimodaltexts.com/ is an interesting discussion on creating multimodal texts that use digital and other media.