
YEAR: 2022-2024
Aside from my design projects, I have also created several illustrations for The Reporter, the student newspaper at Miami Dade College.
It served as a work study program and offered opportunities for students interested in positions related to the field of journalism. While I myself wasn’t planning in pursuing journalism, I thought it was a great opportunity to bring my skill sets to the table and work with people in different backgrounds and fields. I was one of their editorial illustrators and worked for them from 2022-2024. I consider this place as my first “job” and client.
These illustrations were commissioned to me by the writers at the newspaper, so I had no involvement in the writing of these articles or any of the opinions presented in them. My job was to simply bring them visually to life in a compelling way that reflects the article’s topic.
During my year-long tenure at The Reporter, I contributed over twenty-one Illustrations, ranging from digital to traditional art, for various columns and articles. Some of these illustrations were even awarded by the FSCAA (Florida College System Activities Association) in 2023-2024.
My illustrations, along with their respective articles, have been featured on The Reporter’s official website, most of them being under the “Forum” category, where students voiced their own opinion on topics and subject matters . The articles have also been printed and distributed through newspaper racks across all of MDC’s eight campuses, as well as digitally on their website. You can read the individual columns that my work has been featured in the link underlined here: Archives
I have provided below some samples of what I believe was my best work during my time there with their respective writers. Click on each image to see their accompanying column. I’ve also compiled below some rough sketches and thumbnails I made for these illustrations.
An example of a drawing that is traditionally shaded before finishing the rest digitally. (Click to expand)
A traditionally inked drawing before color is digitally added. Other special effects and elements are painted in digitally. (Click to expand)
Drawing storyboards & rough thumbnail sketches help get ideas across quickly. (Click to expand)
Much like my other projects, I like to take notes and brainstorm a list of key terms and words to get ideas. (Click to expand)
More storyboards and thumbnail sketches. (Click to expand)
YEAR: 2024
Similarly in the same vein as The Reporter, I’ve worked as an editorial illustrator for FIU’s student newspaper, PantherNOW, for a short period of time during the summer of 2024.
I’ve only produced three standalone illustrations for them, all of them being a hybrid of digital/traditional art. Check them out below. Included are also the rough sketches and thumbnails
Thumbnail drawings for the shrinkflation cartoon. (Click to expand)
Thumbnail drawings for the budgeting illustration (Click to expand)
More thumbnail drawings of the budgeting illustration. This is closer to the final version. (Click to expand)
Traditional sketch art for the shrinkflation cartoon. Color and effects are added digitally. (Click to expand)
Traditional sketch art for the summer stress illustration. Color and effects are added digitally. (Click to expand)
YEAR: 2020-2023
This is a video demonstrating my process of creatively manipulating and editing images through Adobe Photoshop. This video was produced in 2023 when I was doing freelance photo editing work for clients online as a side gig. Works shown here were produced from 2020-2023.
This type of work, commonly known as “photoshopping”, is very popular throughout the internet and social media for its humorous and surreal nature. Manually manipulating and transforming images is a rigorous process of layers, channels, photos, masking, and editing to create a compelling piece of imagery. Unfortunately, with the power of AI image generation tools nowadays, this process can be seen as primitive to some.
However, editing images in Photoshop is still considered a valuable skill and very much sought after, especially in the movie industry and thumbnails for YouTube videos. I still very much use Photoshop for retouching and manipulating images, especially for editorial & layout. You can see a lot of it when I worked with Strike Miami magazine.