I’ve always thought of myself as a fine arts person, mainly creating traditional art using acrylic, charcoal, watercolor, etc. When I learned about Freestyle, I knew that I had to expand into the digital world. What I’ve discovered is, literally, unreal! Learning the different tools was a huge learning curve for me, but it was worth every painful moment, to grasp the power you have at your fingertips.

I grew up telling a lot of stories because I have a lot of imagination. Through my Freestyle experience, I was able to expand my imagination in “how” to tell my stories.

Here is a link to my fine arts portfolio, BEFORE my digital journey.

Queen’s Magic Hammer and Mr. Mouse

I created a “weapon” using Maya, ZBrush and Substance 3D Painter. But instead of creating a weapon that kills, I wanted to create a weapon that heals. I imagined a queen holding this weapon to protect her people by blocking the enemy’s attack. But beyond that all the beautiful things in the world come out from the faces of the hammer to cover the people with hope.

Mr. Mouse comes from the same world as the queen’s weapon. He protects the queen with his loyalty, valor, and style. He will stand guard to protect his queen at all cost. I used different fabrics to give him a nice outfit and even golden boots. He has a stoic expression but the flower on his head reveals his gentleness.

I have a butterfly theme going through the two 3D items. Butterfly, of course, represents the many stages of life: incubation, birth, growth, and finally beautiful freedom. This 3D world has a theme of transformation, which is what I had gone through as a digital artist being born.

Mirror Image

Through two years of photograph blogging, I explored many ways to represent an idea through images. Combining that with the power of Photoshop, I learned how to “bend” any image to tell a story. I combined several photos that I took, added a psychedelic swirl I created with a watercolor brush and used Photoshop to create a piece called “Mirror Image”. This is a depiction of a fictional world that we had created with a compelling story. My story was staged in a dystopian world where there were too many convicts to house them in prison. And therefore, scientists came up with a way to erase the inmates memories and send them back into society. My protagonist slowly discovers his past through various plot twists and must make a decision whether to go back to the life of crime or to make an atonement for his sins. Mirror Image is the climax where his old self and the new self clashes to make that decision. Spoiler alert. The protagonist decides to do what’s right and he blows up a huge building full of his old gang members, including himself, in order to save the world from another Covid-like pandemic.

Multiple-Layer Project

Being a digital artist, I was able to conceptualize a 3D world in this multiple-layer project, first by creating layers of a world in Illustrator, representing depth, and then using a laser cutter to cut each layer, then assemble the light box, and then use After Effects 3D to peek into the multiple layers. The final physical light box is unreal.

Reflection

Through my Freestyle experience, I gained huge experience into the digital world. But the saying goes, “The more you know, the more you realize how little you know.” Well, I realized that I only got a glimpse into the vast digital artist’s world. Because I have always enjoyed creating, and will continue to create, the knowledge that I have gained through Freestyle will enhance my passion for artistic creativity for all of my future. My dream job would be to brainstorm and create the next artistic piece that will inspire others.