Lego: Rebuild The World
The sequence shows how Lego’s Rebuild the World campaign values innovation and creativity by giving people the freedom to create their own worlds. The girl is literally taking power into her own hands and igniting her future and inspiring kids around the world to do the same.
Style Frames
Process
As a girl who loves legos herself, I intentionally made the character female to make Lego more inclusive and less male centric.
Knowing that this project would be style frames, I took advantage of my illustration skills to overlay on top of the 3D model to work more efficiently and create the lighting effect I wanted.
Spotify: Soundtrack Your Life
Spotify Soundtrack Your Life sequence shows how tedious chores can be fun and the impossible can be made possible through the help of music. We follow a young farmer boy and his dog struggling to harvest their daunting vegetables until the sound of music summons colorful bugs to come to their aid, dancing and singing the whole way through.
Style Frames
Partner: Dahsom Seo
Process
We went through multiple passes early in our storyboarding phase to nail the composition because we knew we needed very clean linework that would be hard to edit later on.
We made black and white passes to block in our values and photo compositing to help us find the right angles.
We chose to work in a detailed illustrative style with fantastical elements as we felt music has a lot of complexity and needed an energetic and whimsical execution.
Usual Suspects
In the movie, Verbal weaves a fabricated story for the police, treating it like a game, while concealing his true intentions. Using the ace playing card as a metaphor for Verbal, the card is known as the "death card" and can be perceived as the weakest or strongest depending on the game. Playing cards frequently involve strategy and misdirection - both elements Verbal employs in his story. The use of red string, typically seen in police investigations, builds tension and foreshadows the misdirection to come. Verbal's alias, "the devil", is similarly associated with misfortune and death. The intricate weaving of the strings mirrors the complexity of Verbal's lies, leading up to the final reveal.
Style Frames
Process
I rented a 100mm macro lens and made my laundry room into a makeshift photo studio.
I made the playing card from plywood, nails, and variations of string. Though the string in the sequence looks consistent, I discovered I had to use yarn as well to get more texture.
Perception
Our animated short features a parable inspired by the saying, “the only difference between a flower and a weed is judgement”. Through the use of flower symbolism, we explore how our confidence as individuals can be shaped by external influences and prevent us from appreciating our resilience and uniqueness.
Animation Short
Partners: Cathy Xiao, Tiffany Shen
Frames
Process
While designing we decided our world didn’t have to be realistic, the only important quality was to contrast the sharpness of the weed with the roundness of the “beautiful” flowers.
Our project had many shifts from mood, color, to composition, so it was important that we lined up shots side by side to make sure there was cohesion, but also variety. Viewing it this way also allows us to see if the overall story points and mood for each act was successful.
Imitation Game
At the end of the movie, Alan Turing and his team are burdened with the task of deciding who lives and dies in the war. We used light as our character to represent choice. We used objects people often choose between, starting from their childhood to adulthood. As we get older, our choices can have more devastating outcomes and can influence other peoples lives on a mass scale. We ended the sequence with a scale to show how choices, big or small, have an impact and there is a constant struggle to balance morality.
Style Frames
Partner: Ewan Lee
Process
My partner and I communicated daily on Miro, sending updates and references to make sure our models and compositing looked consistent. We had a lot of fun including a lot of hints and metaphors for the movie through light, backgrounds, and shadows.
We made sure we had interesting compositions throughout that ended on a low angle shot to show the severity of the final decision.
