Welcome!
Hi! I am so honored that you are checking out my page, and my work.
Introduction
My name is Yuting Wang, and I go by ‘Lucy’ at Freestyle and Mountain View High School. In this coming fall, I will be starting my freshman year at UC Santa Barbara with an intended major in Biology! In addition to my interest in science, I am very passionate about media arts, and Freestyle has taught me to pay attention to how I can use my skills in digital media to tell stories.
So, my Freestyle project that I would like to Showcase and am excited to receive feedback from you about is my profile documentary animation that I created in March through May in 2022.
This project is special to me, because not only did I grow as a visual storyteller and become more proficient at producing content using Photoshop and After Effects, I also learned important values behind tackling challenges and giving back to the community in one’s unique way. Let me explain more about what I mean.
My Documentary project involved interviewing a significant figure in my community and to portray their story in a creative manner. My Documentary website, linked below, features my preparatory work for the project that will provide in-depth context, specifically my introduction and interview transcripts. I kindly ask you to explore this page before watching my Showcase video.
After gathering my interviews, transcript and in recording, I chose to visually portray the anecdote that Ms. Sandra shared that touched me the most. That anecdote describes the initial failures of one of her first attempts at teaching a young child – and lasting wisdom that the experience imparted on her.
From March to May 2022, I worked on creating a 2D animation, corresponding with that segment of the recording. Storytelling, to be able to viscerally share the lessons that she learned, was my goal.
Showcase
I hope you’ll enjoy my animation below! I’ve also created a Showcase video in the block below to share my inspirations for the visual designs of this animation.
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To explain some of my thought processes for the design choices behind this animation, I created a Showcase Video which is embedded in this piano photo. I hope you will find it interesting!
I also would like to share a showcase reel of my animation works & snippets that I enjoyed working on the most. I’ve included a range of 3D Bifrost Fluid and character animations, sections from my documentary and narrative II animations, as well as the conceptual projects (flipbook, phenakistoscope, and paper animation) I created when I first became a student at Freestyle Academy in junior year. I included a range of media in my reel to communicate my diverse interest areas and skills in the arts fields and in storytelling.
*(The Bifrost Fluid animations were for my Zenith Project, for which I chose to investigate how to create fluid simulations in Autodesk Maya and created a compilation of my final renders. I’m also in the process of creating tutorial videos showing how I made the animations. If you have time, you can check it out on my Zenith tab!)
If there are additional parts you are curious about and would like to discuss, please feel free to reach out to me at lucyw@freestyleacademy.rocks.
Reflections
Here are my thoughts on my personal growth as a digital artist and my Freestyle experience!
I’ve enjoyed drawing and crafting since I was a tiny 3-year-old. However, before I became part of Freestyle, I had never dabbled with digital art or media platforms. Learning through the Academy to create original content using Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects, InDesign, Dreamweaver, and audio-synthesis applications such as Pro Tools has opened large windows for me. In particular, the design-your-unique-project philosophy at Freestyle has also been invaluable. I’ve gained the feeling that no skill is impossible to be learned, especially if I am able to navigate the resources across the Internet and from professionals in the field (like you!).
I believe the following skills I’ve picked up from Freestyle will be practical when applying to many career options: design; coding using jQuery, CCS, HTML; creating music using virtual instruments.
Creating for thematic projects across English, Animation, and Digital Media classes, I’ve also grown as an interdisciplinary artist to pay attention to crossroads between technology, language, and science fields. Your work in interdisciplinary arts inspires me and I would love to learn more it.
Thank you so much for your time and feedback!!