Portfolio

Rocks and Boulders

Watercolor

House

Watercolor 

Barns

Watercolor

Fall

Watercolor

Still life

Color pencil

Peony

Color pencil 

Petunias

Oil on canvas

Yellow flowers in a green bottle

Oil on canvas

Daisy

Oil on canvas

Piglet Pajamas

Pencil Sketch

Hiker

Pencil Sketch

New Fashion?

Pencil Sketch

The Moon Experience

The Moon Experience is an interactive and immersive virtual reality system based on the historic Apollo Program (1961-1972). The goal of this project is to demonstrate how to create an effective learning experience in a virtual space. The project draws upon technologies and approaches from multidisciplines. The virtual lunar world is established through virtual reality technology, which provides participants with immersive firsthand experiences. Computer game technology reinforces the effectiveness of the learning environment. Motion capture and computer animation facilitate real-time interactions between users and the system to sustain the sensation of being on the Moon. Learning principles and storytelling give the participant proper situated learning content. Providing a framework of narrative helps to heighten the audience’s perception, trigger their imagination, and transcend the virtual reality’s current limitation.

The Animation with Music

Given a piece of music by John Cage, I was asked to create an animation. I thought the final work should be something abstract like the works of Oskar Fischinger, Len Lye, and Norman McLaren. The music brought to mind a tranquil scene of a pond full of joy and energy. Flowers were animated with blend shapes; tadpoles were animated with bend deformers; and background was animated through keyframing texture.

The South Dakota Lightning Mapping Array (LMA) consists of 10 sensor stations that monitor very high frequency radio waves emitted by lightning. This dataset provides detailed information about a lightning event that occurred in western South Dakota around 2:50 PM on July 19th, 2014. The lightning flash contour data were generated by the scientists based on the raw LMA data. The lightning showed in this work lasts about 1.5 seconds. The animation repeats the lightning event 14 times played at the actual speed of the event to illustrate detailed 3D lightning observations and the lightning's dynamic progression providing a unique perspective on extreme weather. The project details can be found via the link:  https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4315

El Niño - Atmospheric River in January 2016

Atmospheric rivers are narrow corridors or filaments of concentrated moisture in the atmosphere. They play a central role in the global water cycle. Atmospheric river is one of good indicators of El Niño. This animation shows the activities of atmospheric river in January 2016, mainly through three datasets - precipitation, water vapor, and cloud. Precipitation is showed in green-to-red for liquid precipitation and blue-to-purple for frozen precipitation (please see the color bars below), which is from IMERG. Water vapor (from MERRA 2) is illustrated in light blue color. Cloud (from GOES 15) is pictured in white. The project details can be found in https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4445 .

Active fire, precipitation, and drought code over Indonesia

In Indonesia, the Drought Code (DC) component is used to track the potential for agricultural fires to escape underground into peat soils, where they cannot be extinguished until the return of the monsoon rains. From August to October, areas of concentrated fire activity and high DC caused continuous smoke emissions and hazardously poor air quality until the return of the monsoon rains in November. Scientists are working with the Indonesian Agency for Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics and the Ministry of Environment and Forestry to augment their operational FWI system with GPM precipitation. Active fires are indicated by black circles. The project details can be found via the link: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4634 .

Using Satellite and Ground-based Data to Develop Malaria Risk Maps

Malaria is a major problem in the Amazon where malaria mosquitoes tend to prefer wet, hot areas with more standing water. Seasonal occupational movement along rivers and in forested areas increases transmission and concentrates malaria in specific regions.

The project is to develop a detection and early warning system for malaria risk in the Amazon. Using data from NASA satellites and a Land Data Assimilation System (LDAS), we hope that the research can help health officials pinpoint where to deploy resources and what resources to deploy during a disease outbreak. Visualizations focus on Peru, one of the central areas of malaria transmission in the Amazon. The project details can be found via the link: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4581

Aquarius Sea Surface Temperature 2011-2015 

Aquarius is an international effort to measure sea surface salinity and learn about the interaction between ocean circulation, the water cycle and climate. Besides salinity, Aquarius also measures sea surface temperature because salinity and temperature determines seawater density and buoyancy. Sea-surface density drives formation of ocean water masses and three-dimensional ocean circulation. Thus better understanding of ocean salinity and temperature improves understanding of the ocean's capacity to store and transport heat. The animation shows the changes of sea surface temperature from September 7, 2011 to May 20, 2015. The project details can be found at here: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4332 .