Freestyle Academy proudly presents

Close Your Eyes: A Junior Narrative Illustration by Mia Polcyn (2018)

My flash fiction, titled Close Your Eyes, is the story of a curious boy who lives in a utopian world where everything is electronic and emotionless. He constantly wonders about rumors he has heard about the outside world: an imaginary wonderland full of spectacular shades of green and blue throughout the trees, hills, and rivers. Tristan, the adventurous teenager has a wild out of body experience in this so-called wonderland. This story is meant to exaggerate the current aspects of our world and a possible outcome of our continued advancement in technology.

To begin the construction of my scene, I brainstormed different animals that represented Tristan’s personality and character traits. I recognized his curiosity through a cat, purity through a butterfly, youth through a pig, and his innocence through a lamb. With these animal ideas, I started to sketch a hybrid of all the animals I mentioned. I also sketched a possible idea for my background. Because I wanted to capture the essence of the mundane city with an unexpected twist, I decided to use a perspective which peered through a window into a spaceship filled with hundreds of repetitive buildings. We were required to use point perspective, which is seen within the window. At first while using Illustrator, it was difficult to plan out my background, as I desperately wanted to portray a noticeable spaceship while still casting the full effect of the bland city. Once I started to go with what I had, I started to see the big picture and really enjoyed the product that was soon to come. Next time I would attempt to spend more time on adding highlights and shadows to my character to make it seem more life-like.
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