Self Portrait: The purpose of this integrated Self-Portrait Project is begin to learn communication techniques and skills to explore and answer the question of "Who am I?" in various mediums using a variety of modern professional equipment and applications such as Mac OS, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Dreamweaver, Apple Garageband, Apple Final Cut Pro, and Google Apps. I found a lot about myself during this unit. As well as figuring out my style. I have been learning the value of time management, also I am learning something totaly amazing and new every day I am here.

Narrative 1: The purpose of this integrated Narrative 1 Project is to learn more communication techniques and skills to explore and answer the question of "How well can you visually tell a structured story?" in various mediums using a variety of modern professional equipment and applications such as Mac OS, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Dreamweaver, Adobe Flash, Apple Final Cut Pro, Avid Pro Tools and Google Apps. The main focus of this unit was to teach us and have us practice how to visually communicate and tell a story. In english we wrote the story down and analyze the story for visual cues to convey the emotions we portrayed with our main characters. Then we used those cues and the story to write up a screenplay of our story for the animatic and animation. The animatic helped in the creation of my animation, as well as using the graphic novel that I created to timeout the scenes. In design we had to use props and have a model to show our character and there want and needs of their conflict in the story. In Web/audio we had to animate an animation of our story as well as create a website that features all of our work. The pages hold each individual element that makes up the project as a whole with my short story, animatic, character portrait, and animation. I thought that I had a very strong start to the unit, however towards the end I have been struggling to complete both the animation and this website on time. I really wish that I had more time to complete this project and put out my best work.

Documentary: For the Junior Documentary Project, all Junior Freestyle students locate an intriguing location and search within for compelling stories to answer the question "How do you authentically portray the untold stories of your community?". All students gather primary and secondary research sources to develop an informed angle on a chosen documentary research topic which serves as the basis for a research paper, book, film, and website. This unit emphasizes sound research, "truth" in storytelling as well as argumentative structure necessary for effective documentary storytelling. Throughout this project I have changed as a writer, designer, and personally. I have had a lot to juggle more recently so this project had to be one of my top priorities, and it has really payed off; I have already been getting more positive feedback about my book and I am starting to get more orders everyday. I am so proud of myself and greatful for the support from my family, without them I would not have done this project to this level.

Experimental: For the Junior experimental Project, all Junior Freestyle students will develop their abstract thinking and communication skills to answer the question "How can I use unconventional forms to express myself?" in poetry, music, art, film, and web production. This unit emphasizes creative and strategic risk-taking in communicating social or political themes. This project originally started in english when we started exploring the Beat poets and other movements. We then began to write free verse poetry and a haiku, along with a total of 125 lines, including a song. We used our concept statements that were formed by us picking a feeling and a action out of a hat, then begin creating metaphors and ideas that we could write about that all are based off of our concept statement, mine was I am exploring the feeling of dread when preserving memories. I linked this to my new findings of yoga and meditation. All of my poems have both a mental and physical battle element that is simulating the wall that I put up to avoid things. I learned a lot from this unit, a lot about myself and everything that revolves around the wall that I put up. I also had a few epiphanies that resulted in me really understanding the different elements of technology that we use and the programs. I really enjoyed this unit…for me it was a nice break from the rush from the documentary and all of the stress.

Senior Profile: For the Senior Profile Project, Senior Freestyle students will find an intriguing person and research the subject's influence on others. Students gather primary and secondary research sources to develop a distinct perspective on the person's life which serves as the basis for a research paper, magazine article, film, website, and presentation. This unit emphasizes character-based and narrative style journalism rather than the issue-based and essay style storytelling structure of the Junior Documentary Unit. You will be responsible for organizing a Profile Project Proposal in May of your Junior year. This requires you to make contact with your prime subject, determine his/her community influence and meet with all teachers to finalize your plan prior to the end of Junior year. Your culminating profile experience incorporates key elements of your work in English, Design, and Film/WebAudio into a presentation of 5-7 minutes.

Music Video:

Some of my production goals for this unit were to create an original piece of music, produce it, and create an interactive website. I was working with Kiyoshi Taylor, a fellow web/audio student, and Emma Bridgland, an excellent film student, and our wonderful vocalist Casey Marquez, who is a part of Mountain View High School’s choir program. I took the role of organizing everything and everyone and scheduling studio time, as well as working with Kiyoshi on the final edit of our song, Alien Anthem. I also recruited Casey to sing for us, as well as recording my own guitar loop, which we mixed into the chorus.I learned a ton about my own work ethic, and what I am capable of doing while using both reason and Pro tools. I also advanced my knowledge of DreamWeaver and web design, I was able to implement another site’s button motion into my own with the help from Mr. Flo. I think that I value the experience of working in collaboration with the film students, as well as learning more about producing music in both protools and reason simultaneously.

I was trying to come up with a classic story told in a slightly more unconventional way. I struggled the most with the ending… but thanks to Mr. Greco I was able to solve the problem by making the dad give Lena her acceptance letter that she had received and also giving her a plane ticket to go off to college, after spending a few years trying to find herself and not being successful in doing so by staying at home. Overall I really enjoyed writing these stories, and I felt as if I would have read them in an actual book by the end of the process. We never officially wrote a screenplay however I structured each narrative to be a portion of what a screenplay might consist of. I really wanted my book jacket to look simple, yet a little bit informal in comparison to how serious a portion of the story is. My idea was to use purple and yellow, which are complementary to one another. I changed the color scheme up from my last one, orange and blue. I really worked hard to make my book jacket look more put together than I care to admit, but it did come out almost exactly how I had imagined it, which is always exciting.

My Portfolio Showcase went really well ,I am proud of the worlk that I have created here at freestyle, especially my writing. I have never been great at writing but now I feel like I can write just about everything and anything with all of my heart. I am proud to be able to say that I was a part of this amazing program and everything that I have accomplished within it. Thank you I hope you enjoy seeing my journey.