Welcome to my website! I’m Sabrina Barlow, and I am a senior at Freestyle Academy with a focus on Design. At Freestyle, I have been able to explore many different ways to creatively express myself, including different technologies, mediums, and styles. I have seen myself grow as an artist and a graphic designer, while also growing my technical abilities.
Outside of Freestyle, I love spending time with my family and friends, listening to music, and enjoying nature. I love all types of adventures, from food tours to roller coasters. I love stories and how they are created, and have loved writing since I was young. I love to use my creativity to communicate ideas and connect people, both through words and design.
This fall, I plan on attending BYU as an undecided major. Although I’m not sure what I want to do with my life, I am always open to new experiences and love to learn about everything around me. I hope to continue to learn and grow as I begin my college journey and beyond.
My Documentary Book
For my showcase, I would like to share my documentary book, which I wrote, photographed for, illustrated, and designed. This was a very fun project which really challenged my skills to work on a larger-scale piece that needed to feel cohesive. It was also interesting to work with this new, more physical medium, because I had to figure out how pages would interact with each other in the real world, instead of just on a screen.
I used a variety of technology and applications to bring this book to life. I used a DSLR camera to take the photos seen in the book and then edited them in Photoshop. I created my illustrations in Adobe Illustrator, and then combined all of these elements with the text in InDesign. I learned a lot about InDesign through this project, by designing my layouts in the application, and working with the text and formatting.
Overall, this was a challenging but really fun and rewarding project that I’m excited to share with you! Once you have watched the video introducing it, you can click on my book cover to the right and read my book for yourself!
Showcase Reel
This is a collection of a lot of my Design projects here at Freestyle, which was really fun to put together because I got to see all the different styles I have worked with and how much I have grown.
Reflection
One thing that I love about Freestyle is the way that each of our projects combine elements from our different classes. The documentary book, for example, combined my efforts from both my English and Design classes. In English I wrote a research paper that pushed me out of my comfort zone but ultimately helped me improve my writing. I was also challenged by the work in Design, photographing our subjects, illustrating GDEs (Graphic Design Elements), and designing the layout of each page. The words I was writing in English interacted with the layout of the pages I was creating in Design.
This interdisciplinary approach helps me to explore how different fields are related, and how they can be combined to make something even better. I have become passionate about this approach, especially in the combination of art and technology, which is really well represented by both Freestyle itself and my documentary book. I felt like creating this book played to two of my strengths and interests, art and engineering.
Through this project, I learned a lot about myself and gained a lot of skills and experience that I will definitely use as I move forward in whatever field I am in. I feel like I have really grown as a digital artist through my time at Freestyle.
Thank you so much for taking the time to review my work. I look forward to hearing your feedback!