Introduction
Hello, welcome to my Showcase Website. My name is Weiyi Cheng. I’m a student in Los Altos High School and Freestyle Academy. I took English, Digital Media and Animation in Freestyle. I learned both 2D and 3D animation in Freestyle. I really love them. Compared to 2D drawing, I’m more skilled at creating digital 3D works. However, although 2D animation is more challenging, completing it brings a greater sense of accomplishment.
ShowCase Video
The project I’m going to share is one of the ones I’m most proud of – a 2D animated documentary created entirely by myself. This is the first animated film I’ve ever completed, and while I’m thrilled to have done it on my own, it’s not my drawing or editing skills that really make me proud. What I’m most proud of is my ability to creatively design each scene and shot to tell the story in a meaningful way.
I spent a lot of time planning every detail and thinking carefully about how to express each moment visually. It wasn’t easy, and I had to fully utilize my imagination and problem-solving skills. Since I’m still learning how to draw well, I used images I found online and then edited and remodeled them heavily to fit the style and message of the documentary. My goal was to make everything relevant and purposeful, and I put a lot of thought into making each part contribute to the overall story.
ShowCase Reel
This short video showcases some of the projects I’m most proud of from my two years at Freestyle Academy. I hope you enjoy it.
Watching these projects again brings back a lot of emotions. It reminds me of all the wonderful moments I experienced at Freestyle. I’m deeply thankful once again to all my teachers and classmates.
Reflection
I’m presenting one of my proudest projects – a 2D animated documentary. It’s really special to me because it’s the first time I’ve done an animation work completely on my own. From the very beginning, I did all the planning and subbing, to the post-production animation and editing, all by myself, which in itself is a huge achievement for me.
But what I’m most proud of is not really that I finished it, or that I completed the project independently, but the various creative decisions I made in telling the story – every scene, every shot I tried my best to make them meaningful and expressive. I really spent a lot of time thinking about every detail. I wanted every second of the picture to convey some emotion, not just “look good. Sometimes I’ll be stuck on an idea for hours, just trying to find the best way to express it.
Since I’m not very good at drawing at the moment, I find a lot of images on the internet and then I do all sorts of manipulations and transformations – cropping, color grading, adding special effects …… until they look like something I created myself. I worked very hard to make all the images visually and emotionally unified and coherent. I didn’t want the animation to be just some images moving, I wanted it to really tell a story and express something.
This project has taught me a lot, not only about the technical aspects of animation, but also about how to tell a story and how to persevere when things get difficult. It made me realize that even if I don’t have a lot of tools or experience, if I put enough passion and thought into it, I can create powerful work. That’s why I’m especially proud of this documentary – it’s not just a school assignment, it’s a piece of work that I put my heart into.