Hi there! Welcome to my website, a digital home for all of my Freestyle works that I’ve created. I’m currently a senior at Mountain View High School and have been a Freestyle student for two years now. I’ve taken classes in Digital Media, English, and Animation! I’ve always been a very artistic and creative person, even as a child. For example, I love to handmake cards for my loved ones on every special holiday, and I also love to paint in my free time.
For my Showcase, I have chosen to present my Explorations Project and Zenith Project. Both of these projects were self-directed and individualized projects done at the end of my junior and senior year, respectively. They both center around my game design skills, as I’ve found game design as a great way to combine my love for the arts with my passion for academics and computer science. While my Explorations Project was created through my Macbook system’s Java coding feature and features 2D Art, my Zenith project dove into the world of 3D game art and allowed me to learn about Unity, an app I had never used before.
This fall, I will be attending the University of Southern California‘s School of Cinematic Arts to study Game Art. I feel incredibly grateful and excited to be attending this program, as it’s been at the top of my list since the beginning of my senior year. I hope to also pursue a double major in Animation and/or a minor in Game Programming. I’m not entirely sure what I would like to specifically like to do career-wise, as I wouldn’t want to just solely focus on working as a game designer (although I am definitely interested in working on game projects). I’m also interested in being a part of the teams that create animated films, so I hope that I can translate some of my game art skills into that field as well! Mainly, I’m really passionate for being able to tell meaningful stories whether it be through games or animated films.
My experience with my Explorations project helped to set off my passion for game design. It was the first time I had taken an interdisciplinary approach to art, and I found that I really enjoyed combining it with computer science. By creating game art, not only did I get a better understanding of writing code and connecting outside assets with it, but also art itself and how to make it look cohesive as a whole. I learned how to develop an appropriate color palette to make the game look like it was meant to fit together like a puzzle, and I also learned the value of simplicity in such a large project. I also self-taught myself easy methods to make the dimensions of my art line up with the numbers in my code that had already been written. The Explorations project felt like one of my most fulfilling Freestyle projects because it allowed me to be creative while also satisfying the part of me that loves to figure out algorithms and puzzles; my engaging in something so new, I was able to problem solve issues between the intersection of code and art, which I think is a very meaningful skill to have in this new day and age.
With my Zenith project, choosing to learn an entirely new application in such a small time frame was definitely a daunting and risky task. It was inevitable that I got stuck using Unity a lot and ran into many issues during my project, such as collisions not working properly or code not being executed as they should. However, from a lot of these obstacles, I learned how to better use my resources to find what was wrong with my game and was able to problem solve each of my issues. I definitely will carry my Unity experience into my learning at USC and into my future projects, as I really enjoyed using it and playing around with its features. Overall, I’m incredibly proud of the Zenith project I was able to create. I’m really happy with how the aesthetics and visuals of my game came out, and I also like that I was able to somewhat give the setting an underlying story that extended beyond just a plain terrain. I deepened my passion for character design as well as creating aesthetic lighting in 3D environments. I also think that my Zenith project is a very fitting reflection of myself and what I’ve grown to discover about myself throughout high school. I enjoy being artistic and creative through storytelling and creating aesthetically pleasing visuals, while also being able to tap into my nerdy, STEM side with coding.
As a whole, my Freestyle experience was honestly one of the best things to happen to me. Before I had joined Freestyle, I was someone who sometimes did art on the side when I could, but never had the time or opportunity to really unleash my creativity. However, when Freestyle came along, I learned how to use so many different applications and techniques, and found that my passion for art extended beyond just painting and drawing. I think I grew exponentially as a digital artist, and even became a designer for SLAM Magazine on the side as a result of Freestyle! These past two years have not only taught me certain skills to use, but how to creatively apply them and think outside of the box. Freestyle helped me to realize what I was passionate about – previously, although I was good at STEM and other academic subjects, they never really excited me. Thinking about having to go into a career in an academic subject seemed like a nightmare to me. However, being in the Freestyle environment that let me create my own original pieces of art made me realize that I could go into a career that I actually enjoy. Additionally, looking back on some of my junior works, I’ve realized that my digital art has helped to boost my confidence. I’m no longer as reserved and scared to speak up, as I’ve created things that I’m proud of and genuinely want to speak about. I’m so incredibly grateful for all my teachers at Freestyle that have helped to facilitate my growth here, as it’s helped me set forth a direction for what I’d like to do in my career and future. With Freestyle, I feel a lot more confident and prepared going into college, and I know that I can do anything I set my mind to.