What’s a Zenith?
In general I understood the senior zenith project to be something really big and intimidating. I was honestly very scared to do this project for a better part of the year. But once I knew what I wanted to do I wasn’t nervous anymore. Now, having finished my zenith I understand it as being the current peak of your interests while at Freestyle. It’s called a zenith because that word encompasses the meaning of the last sentence.
My zenith project is a passion for me because I’ve been really interested in VR since last year. In Novemeber we created virtual reality galleries in Digital Media and I really enjoyed the project so I decided to make a new one for my zenith.
This new gallery was a challenge for me because I fill it with my own pieces instead of just photos I had already taken. Another challenge was also coming up with ideas and actually executing the pieces the way I wanted to.
My zenith project is a 3D virtual reality gallery based off of Carl Jung’s Map of the Soul. Each wall has posters that relate to a different part of the soul. The different walls would also have different color schemes to match the different themes in that part of the soul. In order to create the posters and the gallery itself I used my skills in Illustrator and Photoshop to create my pieces. At the beginning of the year I really didn’t like Illustrator but now and especially after zenith I am a lot more comfortable using it.
Progress Photos
The Gallery of the Soul
Reflection
I’m going to be honest here. I had a really hard time coming up with my idea for this project. Ms. P said we could do anything we want relating to Design, but when you consider all the things in the world almost everything relates to Design in one way or another. So, I emailed Ms. P and asked for help. Right before we scheduled a Zoom meeting I ended up talking to my aunt about Zenith. She told me I should do something relating to KPop since it’s so visual and it’s something I really enjoy. While meeting with Ms.P she asked me what project from Digital Media or Design I enjoyed the most and I said I really liked the 3D virtual galleries we did in November as well as our most recent movie poster project. When I told her about my aunt’s KPop idea she suggested that I incorporate both together to create an immersive 3D gallery full of KPop movie posters. After thinking on it I considered it a good and complex idea so I decided to run with it.
I started by doing a series of sketches based off of music videos and other ideas I had. Then I decided to make my virtual gallery a map. It would be based off of Carl Jung’s Map of the Soul that BTS had used as a base for their Map of the Soul album series last year. One wall would be based off the Persona, the others Shadow and Ego respectively. Each of the walls would also have different color schemes to reflect the different parts of the soul. My influences were mainly from KPop music videos and from BTS’s Map of the Soul albums. Both Persona and 7’s music videos influenced my style and the colors I chose.
If I could do the project over I would want to add in audio to make it like an audio tour in a museum. Unfortunately I ran out of time to do that because I had some personal stuff occur in March that derailed my progress on the work for a few weeks. I believe I improved the most on using both Illustrator and Photoshop to execute my vision. In terms of improving my 21st century skills I think I improved the most on visual literacy. I was able to create images that would convey the message I wanted to my audience. This is something I think I was just okay at before but am now much better. I believe I also improved in my technological literacy for reasons that are basically the same as the ones I just talked about with Photoshop and Illustrator.
In terms of creating my best project at Freestyle I think I succeeded. With this project I had free creative control over the entire thing and that’s one of the things that I valued the most. I got to envision my own thing and create it the way I wanted to. My gallery lives up to my expectations. For a first year senior at Freestyle this is definitely something I’m proud of.