Introduction
This unit focused on self-reflection. We combined a deep dive into ourselves with the variety of skills we’ve learned and continue to improve on. Using this harmony, we developed projects that showcased our stories and learning from all the classes. In English this mainly consisted of the Personal Essay, where we reflected on ourselves and core values to ultimately craft a essay that told our story for our college applications. In Digital Media we traversed various online software, and produced small and medium projects that used these to reveal something about ourselves. In Animation this unit was focused on learning how to model three dimensional objects, which we will eventually use for creating 3D animation. In all of these different pursuits of learning and projects, we sought to capture the essence of who we are, and what we learned about ourselves through reflection.
As we explored the question, ‘Who am I? we created a set of core values that are most important to us. We took these values and used what we had learned about text animation in Adobe After Effects to create a Core Values video:
Digital Mandala
For the Mandala project we learned how to use Adobe Illustrator to create digital art. We used this knowledge to divide the space into pieces (pizza slices) and made it so that what was drawn in one slice was copied onto the rest of them. We then created hundreds (maybe thousands of layers) of digital brush strokes, each one combining to create a detail that told some sort of story from our lives.
This piece was largely inspired by the music I’ve been listening to. Happiness, uncanniness, and even fear-evoking imagery can come together to create something beautiful. I wanted to incorporate a lot of densely-contrasting shapes that blend together and confuse the eye. A lot of these shapes and eyes I’ve drawn within the mandala can be put together in different ways, and the viewer’s eyes are meant to understand these shapes differently every time the piece is observed. Kind of like the song My Eyes by Travis, it is meant to have a transcending, somewhat harrowing effect that ultimately culminates in a peaceful melancholic feeling.
When making my colored mandala, I wanted to depict my artistic self. The first thing I did when starting this work was creating a new layer and drawing the eye. Usually eyes have a lot of blending, but I was drawing one with bright, contrasting colors and thick strokes. This created a dynamic effect and it seems like the eye is seeing through you. Then I drew the shape of hands reaching out from the eye towards the outside. This represents how you use your hands to build off what you eyes perceive. I then added detail with the colors to create a mysterious and visually appealing design. The stippling guides your eyes back to the center, and you are brought back to the eye, which is what art is all about.
Video of illustrating color mandala:
College Personal Essay
In English, Mr. Greco taught us that in order to write a poignant, meaningful college application essay, we must address the question: Who am I? We started by brainstorming how we could answer this question. We selected one of four essay types depending on if we had experienced a significant challenge or knew what subject we planned to study in college. I decided to focus my essay around film. I wrote about my life, incorporating an extended metaphor about the movies I imagine in my head. Although I developed an idea of how I think and how my life experiences have shaped me, I was not fully able to answer the question “Who am I?” I think that is because I am still figuring it out.
Motion Graphics
In Digital Media this unit, we learned how to use Adobe After Effects to create motion graphics. This was really fun and has enabled me to create dynamic videos using After Effects key-framing. At first it was daunting because there are so many options After Effects presents you with, but as I learned it became really enjoyable and enabling.
My Cool Graphics and Audio: A project where we learned how to synch motion graphic animations to an audio that played. I then created my own creative display of these techniques.
My simple Motion Graphics: Learning various object and text movements we could easily animate using key frames. I experimented with various of these in my creation.
Rotoscoping: Cropping parts of a video out to select only the parts you want. This can be used to superimpose videos onto each other naturally, and we practiced combining this with motion graphics and text animations.
Now that I understand how to use these various skills and techniques, I feel that the door has been opened for creative video editing. I am excited to use these skills for future creative projects.
Animation Productions
This unit for Animation, we focused on three-dimensional modeling, and learned various online softwares to do so. Eventually, we combined all of the applications to create detailed three-dimensional renders that we will eventually use for animation.
Skull Render: Model of a skull using ZBrush. ZBrush is mainly used for sculpting and detailing.
Head Render: using ZBrush, we took the skull we had rendered and used it to shape a head on top. This was really difficult due to the way ZBrush functions work, especially since the cavities on the skull had to be filled in for it to look like a face. My head is kind of scary as a result.
Table Render: This was our first 3D model that combined all three softwares. We started by creating a basic shapes model in Maya. We exported this and opened it up in ZBrush, where we applied details and further sculpted the objects to have more clear shapes. Then we added color, shine, and texture in Adobe Substance Painter, and fully rendered the model with a selected background.
Game Weapon Render: This was another 3D project that combined all three softwares. I chose to replicate the weapon of the Hindu God, Shiva, and added my own colors and carvings to personalize the model.
Character Render: This was our main overarching project for the Reflections unit. We brainstormed and sketched an original character of our design. I came up with the idea of a praying mantis disguised as a human. I thought this would be an interesting character, and spent a lot of time to model all of the details, such as the mantis’s tail poking out from their oversized hoodie. This was a really fun project to see our creation develop. The character, being a 3D model, can be rigged and used for 3D animation projects with fluid camera movement that we will create in the future.
These were my animation projects for this unit! Although it was a lot of learning through trial and error, I can now efficiently create 3D models to use in my animations, combining the three softwares. It’s really fun to do this now and I’m really happy with the results.