Introduction

At Freestyle Academy, I got the chance to learn more about different world topics. The teachers at freestyle have helped me to create multimedia projects and send that out for people in the community to see. With these opportunities, I am able to exercise the skills taught at the academy in a academic and technical way.

The visual narrative projects that we got to do in my classes, helped me appreciate how to export audio recordings with edited sound effects to make it more interesting. This was possible with the access provided by Freestyle Academy through Adobe Premiere Pro and Pro Tools to enhance my abilities as a storyteller. In the digital art aspect of the visual narrative projects, I got the chance to learn how to use Adobe Illustrator to create album covers for my projects and also utilize it for fun for example with the exquisite corpse. A lot of what I have seen on the internet like thumbnail covers for Youtube videos and album covers for music are now something that I have the chance to know how do knowing how to create digital art with the programs provided at the academy.

Story

In English we worked on a Short Story and the process of writing that story, I made a character questionnaire to develop my main character’s motivates and their perspective in the story. The inspiration for this character was taken from the information my English teacher was talking about with true character and characterization, I thought it could be cool to show who a person’s identity is through a gas station worker. When I think about a gas station worker, their characterization is usually by what they wear and true character is their passion and their intentions in the story.

Short Story

For my questionnaire, I wrote: Part 1: My name is John Paul and I am 25 years old. Some distinctive physical character traits are an unshaved beard and often wears a tired looking expression. Covered in gasoline oil from head to toe. Often seen wearing work clothes because John Paul doesn’t want to get his other clothes dirty and he is obligated to do so while he is at work. In his pockets, he holds all of the keys to the gas station, a nail clipper because he usually forgets to clip his nails while he is at home, and his work phone so he can check over incoming shipments for refilling the convenience store part of the gas station and also gas tanks.”Currently living within a small one bedroom apartment that is partly torn down by mold and has typically household appliances that are cheap to buy so these tend to wear out more quickly whenever he uses these appliances. His favorite place that he tends to go is his parents gravestones because that is the closest he feels to his family and the only family he really knows. It is also his way of escaping the reality of his financial position and he tends to feel nostalgic about the past when his parents were alive. His form of transportation is taking the bus because he hasn’t been able to allocate funds into saving up for a car. His only source of income is coming from working at the gas station by the hour and also by tips. His father worked at a hospital and his mom worked as a nurse so they often drove in the same car together to work. John Paul didn’t have a happy childhood as his parents passed away in a car crash when he was 18 years old. He attended a school that was poorly funded and managed but he always spent time after school studying by himself so that he would be more prepared. In the past, he attended church consistently but after his parents passed, it has been on and off and recently the past year he had not been to church. John Paul watches his favorite childhood movies that he used to watch with his family like Back to the Future and the Matrix  on the TV. He expresses himself through looking back at his parent’s photobook of his childhood past. John Paul doesn’t have tap into his artistic passion. His taste in music is often songs made a decade prior to the current time as it makes him feel like he is living in the past. His most prized possession is his family picture that is in his work station at the gas station because he spends a lot of hours at work. His greatest achievement was memorizing a lot of bible verses.

Part 2: John paul hasn’t been in any romantic relationships. He also has no desire to be in any relationship since the passing of his parents but he is willing to make small talk with customers and the closest to a relationship is possibly an acquaintance. His relationship with his parents are cut short by a car crash and after that he had cut off all his friends from his life as a way to cope with this traumatic experience because he doesn’t want to ever experience that kind of pain of losing someone. His main conflict with his past friends is that some try to reach out to him after all these years because they have known about John Paul’s situation and some have felt hurt about how he had ended things so abruptly by not talking anymore. In response, John Paul doesn’t really but he reads these messages. Some of his past friends, he sees as customers around the gas station as they talk sometimes but very little 

Part 3: One of John Paul’s unique behaviors is that he is often seen zoning off staring at random items around the store like at snacks but without anything registering in his mind when he zones off. Something that John Paul wants other people to understand is that he wants people to appreciate how hard he has worked throughout school and work and he lacks the validation and appreciation. But despite all that, he wants people to know that he wants to try his best to put his morals first before his own needs but he has never been given the chance to in a long time so he hasn’t been tested for that in a long time. He doesn’t want others to know of how he is struggling to keep his life together financially so he tries to work extra hours at the gas station. John Paul was more a leader as his parents decided to name him John paul after a pope who is a religious leader.  Greatest fear is losing his family or ever experiencing the pain of losing again.  My biggest regret is not spending as much time with my parents when they were still alive. I feel like my parents have let me down but I can’t describe why but I wish they hadn’t left me so soon. I feel like I have let myself down because I don’t know where or what I’m trying to do in life. The person that I need to stand up most against is myself because I need to figure out who I am and the person who I am now and who I want to be is a constant battle. By the end of my life, I would want to be in a stable condition and find a motivation to work towards something greater in life. For this year, just being able to get by and pay the rent on time is what I want the most this year. For today, I just don’t want to live in fear of the consequences of tomorrow for not measuring up for what I need to do today in my duties at work by getting paid. I think I need to change by continuing to remain steadfast in my morals and also improve my living conditions. I feel like others want me to change by being someone that can properly take care of themselves and since I haven’t strived for anything greater than working at the gas station, people have pity on me and wish that I would try to do something different.

Short Story Album Cover

Character Questionnaire and Plot Map

John clung to the ladder and slid the streaming Christmas lights upon the hooks tightly attached to the ceiling of the Jangle Bangle’s gas station. The lights had comfortably loosely hung over the aisles of the dim light gas station that was in need of desperate renovation. He then descended down the ladder and looked out the window of where his glass cutted table workspace was, observing the sight of the heavy gray clouds that had blanketed the afternoon sky. Painted with flecks of orange, red, and pink amongst spots that sunlight tried to shine past the thinner layer of clouds like gentle hands reaching out from them.

There upon the table, a glow of light illuminated from his phone, the message that had appeared on it wrote, “Account Balance: $111.77”. Suddenly, all the strength that John mustered to go to work that morning had faded away as his legs limply held up him and his posture had become hunched over accompanied with this growing hunger. Succumbing to that gloomy feeling that weighed down his legs each day that he woke up. That morning, he had forgotten to brush his teeth which had further ruined his mood as the smell of the gasoline wafted into the environment as the cars began coming for the early morning traffic.

“What am I going to do with my life,” John thought. The money is just enough to take care of food until my next paycheck but for my other necessities, it will not be sufficient enough. I work like a dog day and night, setting up the whole store by myself. While my superiors sit upon their chairs with stacks of papers piled up upon their desks only to leave it there for days as they talk with each other. Things can never get done and all I want is for people to appreciate what I’ve been doing. 

Suddenly, this intense wave of more hunger had washed over John. It had been the consequences of skipping meals from the days prior coming back to bite him in the stomach. “Maybe I could just wait it out a little longer until the end of the week for my next paycheck” he whispered to himself. 

John had slumped over in his chair waiting for a customer to walk into the store, only to bring more work for him as nobody had bothered to shake off the ice from their boots out front before entering the store, leaving him responsible to shovel it out. The glass door swung open and a person was dressed in a beige crocheted sweater and beanie with mustard yellow pants walked into the store, strutting down each of the aisles with this almost forced confidence but lively nonetheless. John was quite pleased with how this person had taken the time to shake off the snow of her oversized red boots that had wanted to shake loose with each step that she had taken. He couldn’t help but tense up with each turn that she had made around each aisle as she would nearly bump into the shelves.

She then abruptly stopped and decided to buy a hot dog from the food stand which had only furthered my intense hunger. The smell of fast food was enough to make anyone who walked have their senses seized by it. As soon as she had entered the store, she had left with the money placed on the counter. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a wallet on the ground. Part of me had thought that it would be best to return the wallet to the woman that had dropped it but this could be the opportunity I’ve been waiting for. If I had just taken a few bucks for myself for food it would be okay. Afterall, I’ve been working really hard so that it wouldn’t hurt if I take a little something for myself right now. 

At that moment, just as I was about to search through the wallet for some quick cash, my family portrait had captivated my attention. This sadness had rushed over my grease covered hands with each flip of the wallet but remembering that my parents would be ashamed and wouldn’t bother to recognize me if they had seen my actions that I had just committed just now. 

Suddenly, a loud chuckle came out from down the hall and my head turned towards the direction of where the sound had come from. It was one of my co-workers laughing with their faces stained with food grease which would make even someone in hunger like me feel sick. The hunger for food and my selfish ambitions had receded in the pit of my stomach.

The clouds had slowly receded away from the slight sunlight that had begun to pierce the heavy clouds. A warm hand had slowly caressed the bottom of my face as the sunlight shone through the glass window of the gas station and halo figures in the sky had appeared, manifesting in the image of my parents staring in my direction. I slowly closed the wallet and rubbed my finger against the front of the weathered leather. Ultimately, the decision of what I decide to do is my responsibility and my circumstances could not hold the blame for my shortcomings. 

As John began to walk towards the door, a weight had been lifted off his body as his feet began to stop shuffling and his shoulders gradually stood taller. The air around him had become less thick and there she stood, the woman hastily searching the ground to find her missing wallet. Despite everything, he knew that this was the right choice because he knew that he would find something more fulfilling here in this moment than wishing upon every star in the sky to be in anyone else’s situation than his own.

Illustrations

Exquisite Corspe

The Exquisite Corpse project was for a group of people to talk about where the end up points of each panel meet. For what I would be doing in the panel would only be known by me and I wouldn’t know what other people would create for the other panels. I was assigned the first panel. In my panel, I decided to draw a lion and I created ribbons around the lion with a gradient to give the lion a aura that matched the lion’s facial expression.

Illustration Project Choice

In this Illustrator project, my night light stand was taken inspiration from images of flowers off the internet that I thought looked nice. To make the flower stand out more I wanted to try to make the flower look like it was burning with embers around the flower. As I was further in the process of making the engraving for the night light stand, I got inspiration by a video game where the character’s abilities made ice crack out of thin air and I decided to incorporate that into my project.

When I was making this project, I was using Illustrator to create my art work which was a different experience from using photoshop. One tool that really helped me in Illustrator was the pen tool that allowed me to create lines and curves that set down anchor points in which I could manipulate. In the past, I was using Photoshop for other visual projects like rasterizing an image with its pixels. Both programs allowed me to use pressure sensitive brushes but it was different on Illustrator that when I wanted to resize what I drew, it wouldn’t pixelate and still retained its shape. In that aspect, I thought Illustrator was very helpful and more flexible in creating visual digital art for my digital media and english classes. What I took away from this project was that using different artistic programs can be more helpful depending on the art medium I am trying to make, whether that means making an album cover or a drawing to be placed on a physical object. Knowing how to use both Photoshop and Illustrator has helped me learn more about myself that learning new things is a difficult process but I don’t have to stress out and overthink as much as I normally do. It’s part of the learning process.

As I am reflecting, I am most proud of this project was how the final project came out when it was printed onto the glass. Getting to see my project in real life come out nice with the way the colored lights interacted with the engravings was very eye catching. This project further reinforces my appreciation for what other people create using digital programs because of the time and thought that is put into creating digital art.

Music

Experimental Music

The Experimental Music Project was to utilize different kinds of instruments that were provided in Pro Tools. We were allowed to use any kind of instrument, tempo, and genre. This project was intended for us to apply what we learned about Pro Tools to create our own music and I had decided to mainly use the flute instrument and use other kinds of instruments around that using different MIDI channels to record each virtual instrument. The XPand instrument was very helpful when I was creating music, as I would be able to use four different channels for four different instruments.

The inspiration for my song “Flute of Agitation” was inspired by creating a piece of work that would include various instruments that all together create a song that flows together. This was my first song so I didn’t have a clear idea of what I wanted to create so I looked for examples of songs from past students which influenced the rhythm of my song that was partly upbeat and silly at the same time. Some of the instruments were partly inspired by songs that I learned when playing a guitar in middle school when I first started learning it. Like basic three note rhythms and every other beat I would add another beat. After I had the drum pattern I wanted, I used that to give me something to work with for the other instruments and my goal was to make the other sound good together.

From this Experimental Music Production, I was most proud of being able to apply the vacuum and organ instrument into my song because I thought it was a very unique instrument which was definitely a major struggle for me when I wanted to incorporate it into my song. I was struggling to find the notes that sounded good to me and how I would play them, like if I would just hold down the note or not. The vacuum felt like a very powerful instrument as a lot of the presets were blaring loud but I was able to find one that I liked. Being able to include the organ instrument was crucial to me and I thought it had a lot of potential to add something a little different to the last part of the song and it was one of the instruments that I felt was really pleasant to listen to which would balance out the more energetic instruments a little.

Something that I valued about learning how to use virtual instruments for music production was that I didn’t need background knowledge on how to play the instruments which made it a much simpler process if I were to learn how to play all these instruments that are not virtual. The ease of playing a huge variety of instruments was a huge surprise to me and I liked how it didn’t feel restrictive because on top of the choices of instrument, I could also change the sound of one specific instrument like for example acoustic to electric guitar.

The main takeaways that I got from using Pro Tools with the MIDI and production music was getting to get familiar with these digital programs were constructed very differently from the other programs that I was using. My first reaction to using Pro Tools was being intimidated by the amount of different buttons that I saw on the program. After I was taught some of the important buttons and began playing around with the instruments, it was a fun experience hearing how different each instrument sounded and their variants into making a song that was upbeat and goofy at the same time.

Animation

In Animation Class, we get to work on projects in the beginning of the year more on paper. The second half of my junior year, the projects were mainly digitally created using Photoshop and creating a frame timeline to animate individual scenes. Some of the challenges I faced during this time was getting used to drawing on a digital program, I didn’t have much experience with using digital art programs and with a stylus pen that was designed for the Wacom Tablet. I am very grateful that my animation teacher, Mr.Cho had taught us how to use these programs for animation. One important thing that has really helped me was learning how to use onion layer or changing the opacity of a frame to then draw the next animation frame. It made it much easier to draw the motion of the subject into the next frame of what the next motion would be for the subject of the project.

Digital Puppet Design and Puppet Poses

The process of designing a puppet into a physical object was an interesting experience. I found this to be interesting because I had to compromise on how the physical puppet would turn out. My digital design has shorter legs and that wasn’t going to be very stable for the puppet to stand so the process of making the physical puppet was made using a longer “”skeleton” base made from metal wire. In general, the a lot of the body parts were made longer to make it easier to move the puppet.

Lip Sync Animation

This project utilized Photoshop and we had to separately make the different mouth shapes that form letters. Visually when compiling these different mouth shapes together, it made it appear that the character are speaking words to the people who are watching. I chose for my main character to be a cat because of my own pet cat “Cleo” and the background was mostly to be Halloween themed.

Visual Narrative Animation

The Visual Narrative project was a group project, we worked together to divide the work between who would draw the animations for which subjects like the main character, the asteroid, and any other special effects that needed animating. My main contributes were making some of the animations for the asteroid and making all the backgrounds for this project. The main inspiration from this project was it was going to take place in space and one of the group members was at the moment drawing a character and thought it would be a good idea to use Calypso which is the name of the character for this project.

Composite Walk Cycle Animation

This animation had required for us to showcase the walk cycle of our physical puppet and also the digital puppet character. To make this, I used to After Effects to edit both of the characters into one scene. Originally, these were two different clips made seperately and the real puppet had a green screen wall so I could outline the puppet and put the image onto the final video. The digital puppet had a transparent background so it was only the digital puppet that appeared. Honestly, I was proud of being able to complete the assignment. The few things that I would have improved with more time would be fixing the glitching out eye and going back to After Effects to outline the physical puppet better so it doesn’t appear as choppy in the final video.