The Reflections unit in freestyle is a project that covers reflections of our past and ourself, to put it simply. Through this unit we went through processes to reflect on our past and put it down on pieces of paper, pieces of art, or pieces of video. Through this project I was able to learn not only about how to write about myself, but I also learned more about myself. Being able to get through this unit helped me understand more about myself. It would also help me with things like college apps and the common app essay, which was supposed to be all about our life. I was able to write things from personal essays, to videos about the way that I think. The overarching question of this unit was the question of “Who am I”. Through this unit I think I was able to effectively answer that question. Here’s how:

here is a list of items that I consider to be “essence objects”. These are objects in my life that I consider to have a story behind, or just I consider them to be precious to me.

  • 1. My DVD of Aliens with a 3D cover
  • 2. My book of studies on cinematography and story design
  • 3. Hyperbole and a half
  • 4. My EOS M50 camera
  • 5. My Zhiyun V2 Stabilizer
  • 6. A toy dinosaur my friend gave me
  • 7. My rosary necklace
  • 8. My billabong hat
  • 9. A blue blanket on my bed
  • 10. Interstellar poster
  • 11. My second place award for PE multisport competition
  • 12. My DVD of Monty Python’s the holy grail
  • 13. Lego TARS robot
  • 14. Bionicles figurine 
  • 15. Fanta bottles
  • 16. Model of a dragon i got from Taiwan
  • 17. VIP pass to universal studios
  • 18. Birthday letter from my girlfriend
  • 19. Mini Golf score sheet 
  • 20. Pictures with my dad in a place called “The Battery”

Personal Museum Curation

For this project, we went to the SFMOMA and saw some really cool modern art. While we were there we decided to take some photos of the art and create our own little museum that would represent who we are the best. The question of “Who am I” through this project would be represented through symbolism and multiple pieces of art. This was a cool project because of the art that we got to see and how we could relate it to ourselves. Here is the full museum we created:

Ryan’s Fattest Museum
First up are pieces that are most relatable to me

First up:Alexander the Great

I feel like this painting can relate to me in the sense that a royalty can be seen from any sort of portrayal of person or personality. Even though this person dresses as if he was ready to watch a basketball game, he has a sword equipped and a posture that represents nobility. through my sense of personality, I ultimately believe in justice and order despite my adventurous nature.

Next: Eponge

For this one, I believe that this represents me perfectly. These blue and luscious flowers come from rocks that are dull and dark. I believe that these rocks are what sprout beautiful beings like these flowers and that something with ugly beginnings can become something beautiful. These flowers can represent my life and how my upbringing was difficult but brought up a person like me. Hopefully beautiful and hopefully a little successful.

Next: Life Death/ Knows Doesn’t Know

For this painting I believe that this one can represent the style of art that I like to produce. Neon colors can represent that of the near future or that of the 80s or 90s. The fact that it says that “Knows Cares Doesn’t Matter” can represent a lack of matter or care in the world, a place and time where nothing really ever mattered. I believe that this is what represents me because everything I produce I always look for more antique items and a time frame that represents the past of near future. I dream about living in the past. I also love to dress like I’m supposed to be there.

These are pieces that don’t relate to me well

Next: Bijou

Art work such as this clearly does not represent me as it feels too jumbled and messy to explain how my life works. This can represent a life that can be a jumbled mess and that can be a disaster. My life, while it was difficult does not represent a random string of events that don’t exactly work well to create something beautiful but rather gritty and random.

Next: Woman Shaving Her Leg

This artwork can represent being trapped in a simple situation. This appears as if this person is trapped in a situation and is getting out of it at a snail’s pace. I believe that I’ve never been in a situation that has trapped me or left me trying to slowly get out of it. I also usually do not leave problems to the last second, I will usually try and get it out of the way as fast as I possibly can. I would never meticulously struggle to get out of a situation.

Much of the artwork in this museum represents me because most of it shows symbolic situations about my life or things that represent my art styles. For example, the first and the third art pieces show a lot about what my artwork stems from. They usually stem from things like styles or periods of time. Much of my own artwork and projects represent things such as the past, the near dystopian future, or even the style of fashion that I portray. I believe that the ones that didn’t make the cut were too far gone from my styles and any sort of representation of my life. I believe that they were in no relation to my life or even how I think or look. For example, the fifth art piece has no artistic catch to me and I have no way to relate to it. This way I believe that the art pieces that truly catch my eye and deserve a place in my museum are those that represent my looks or my personality.

Personal Mandala

For this project, we had to create our own mandalas in Adobe Illustrator. We had used abilities in Illustrator in order to create whatever type of mandala we wanted. It could have whatever art we wanted inside of it and however many slices we desired. We had used illustrator in order to get the program to create the mandalas for us. We would first create a template, and then we would draw on the template in order to allow the program to rotate our drawings all around the slices of the mandala. Here is my finished black and white mandala.

Here is my laser Engraved Mandala. We had engraved our mandalas onto actual material. I decided to engrave mine on a copper plate.

Here is the colored mandala I created. We did the same thing with the laser mandala except we made it in color.

We also showed the process of every step we took to create the mandala. This is a video that shows the creation of the full mandala.

Here is also a virtual reality zapcode placed on my mandala. This will be used within an app called Zapcode and if you point your camera at this photo, a video will show up of me explaining the value of creating this mandala.

Perspective Piece

for this project we were tasked to create a personal opinion about something. More or less a rant about a topic or idea. We were then tasked to create a video about this idea and then voice over our rant to this video. We would learn a lot about Adobe After Effects and how to use it to create certain effects and animations. With After Effects we would create our video with images and text that would move around on screen. For this project i definitely valued the ability to write what we wanted and to have the ability to rant about things that we disliked.

Personal Essay

For this part of our project, we were tasked to create an essay that would answer the question of “Who Am I”. We would then created an essay that would follow stories in our life, stories of our entire life, thoughts on a page, etc. For this project we had read the book, College Essay Essentials. This would help us create an essay that would help us make a sort of common app essay. Something that would tell everything about the way that we think in just 650 words or less. Here is the essay:

Losing the Accent

We had come to America with nothing. America, being a new environment that scared me and my entire family, had left my five-year-old self horrified and dismayed. My friends were left behind, my school was left behind, my house was left behind – and there was no coming back.  To make matters worse, my father had left the household after his entrepreneurship plan had failed, and my mother was left alone to take care of my brother and I. 

When I started school I was rattled by the stream of events that led the path of my life astray. I saw the environment around me as foreign and peculiar, and I felt as though every action of mine had to be criticized by someone. Being the foreigner of the school, I had no idea how to stand up for myself, and I was picked on. Teachers always associated me with the trouble maker as I had been the “weird kid at school”. I began to feel incredibly lonely and frustrated at my whole situation. No one was there to really help me and I was on my own in a foreign country that didn’t seem to welcome me.

 My troubled situation led me to become depressed. One day I had given up. I asked my mom if we could go back home. So my mother decided to take action in another way and introduce me to a few things that would sidetrack my stress. She gave me  creative tools like editing software she had access to, and a video camera. This way, I would be able to make small videos and little films for my own entertainment. She also signed my brother and I up for a taekwondo program that would help us strengthen our confidence and perseverance. 

Through taekwondo and my early years of filming, I started gaining a huge passion for film and cinematography. I had endured some of the most difficult parts of my life through introduction to these activities and built myself into a better person with self-control and discipline. I made more friends and became more comfortable at school.

Taekwondo was a gateway that would shape who I am. It would give me the athletic capacity to attend the junior olympics in water polo in Los Angeles, and it was something that I credit every path of my life to. Video editing in my early years had allowed me to practice creating films for college apps and Middle College films. I then was able to gain the skills to make drama films that made it into the New Museum Los Gatos and Art Studio; and opportunities to create films for semi professional stunt groups. 

If anything, I wouldn’t have made it here without the family I have left. Being introduced to all these new passions allowed me to get to where I am today. TaeKwonDo and filming had given me control and discipline and allowed me to progress to my truest self. I learned skills like self defense, which gave me more confidence to make friends. I learned key editing skills and cinematography which gave me self-confidence. Some of the failures and troubles I experienced made me more resilient. Today I have the ability to make new friends easily, adapt to new environments and make connections that led me to be the person I am today. 

end.