During my time as a SST student, my favorite 3 software were Keynote, Pages and iMovie. Among the 3, I was intrigued by Keynote the most as I was not only able to create nice slides for presentations, but also able to use it to create digital illustrations.
There are many other software that can do illustrations but I get an extra kick out of seeing how far I can "push" keynote... so whenever I needed to destress, I would turn to keynote to doodle. Drawing is one of my favorite pastimes, but with keynote, my end product is automatically digitized!
One of my proudest keynote drawings is this Optimus Prime (see below). My dad and I share a collection of transformer toys and we even play in the same clan for Transformers: Earth Wars. Coincidentally, we both love Optimus Prime character. One day I saw a cool image of Optimus Prime and decided to draw him out.
The coolest things about Transformers is that they are shape-shifting robots. I enjoy watching how they change from vehicle mode to robot mode and vice-versa. One day, I pondered,
"What would it look like if I animated these robots to make them look like they were transforming? Would it even be possible to use just Keynote to do so?"
Doing this was harder than I realized. At times, I wanted to "cheat" by using software like Blender but was able to hold myself back and stuck to using Keynote to finish the job. Eventually, I got over my initial frustration and was able to create a rather smooth transition. Below is the finished "Bumblebee transformation".
Around this time, my sister's birthday was around the corner. To apply my new found skill in "animation", I decided to create 2 short animated clips of her favorite soft toys. I had to create everything from scratch, which took some time, but was able to complete it before her birthday. Seeing her radiant smile when she saw the clips... worth it!
Although creating digital artworks and animation takes time, I found the process rather fun and therapeutic. I probably can do a better job with other software but knowing I pushed the limits of Keynote was also rather satisfying.
Chia Howie
12 Feb 2022
Update (June 2022): During this year's polytechnic open houses, I was pleasantly surprised to find out that Digital Illustration and Motion Graphics were part of "Visual Communication". It definitely stirred my interest to explore a polytechnic route for my next learning journey.
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