Freestyle Academy proudly presents

Blinded: A Junior Narrative Illustration by Parker Malachowsky (2013)

Blinded by the radiance of my preoccupations. As communicated in the twisting, meandering bone of the buck's antlers, this phrase distinguished much of my more recent, young existence. All the obstacles and associated anxiety characterizing such an evolving time of all of our lives have left me at many times feeling like a deer in headlights. Scared. Tensed. Pensive. Yes, even pensive. For it is in these moments I find myself capable of the most sincere and genuine thought. Only ideas carrying relevance can present themselves, for only the imperative carries any weight. This does not make a decision any easier, but instead makes it all the more difficult, for the choice, whatever it may be, is truly important. And in such a moment, one demanding urgent decisiveness, a question crosses my mind. It also most likely crosses the mind of any driver who has a buck drift into his/her high beams. Is this creature a traveler? Or a wanderer? Am I going somewhere? Or nowhere? And in that moment, we are forced to decide. For my narrative illustration, I decided to create a piece around my self-portrait essay from English class. This assignment called for the use of central image. Thankfully, after having to translate from picture to pen for so long, I was finally able to just show what I had visualized for so long while writing. However, this was of course not as easy as it sounds. Within the illustration, a requirement was to incorporate type , both creatively and effectively. I found especial difficulty with integrating the words ''wander'' and ''traveler'' into the piece. The goal was to have them outline the road in which the deer stood. However, getting to that point was not simple. After referring to the great tutor, Google, I learned a little more on how to operate Adobe Illustrator's perspective grid. This tool allowed me to get the effect I had hoped for. Ms. Parkinson also taught us how to use gradients, which I had fun adding to a couple areas of my illustration.
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