My initial intention in pursuing design is very simple. Since I was young, I've always loved art and painting. I believe art is the highest expression of the human role as creator. If the world were ever faced with destruction, art would undoubtedly be one of the essential seeds of civilization that must be preserved and passed on.

One memorable incident from my childhood, probably when I was in kindergarten, was when my parents took me to visit their friends. While the adults were chatting outside the house and asked me to nap inside the room, I found a pencil (a flat woodworking pencil, which I’m very impressed with). That afternoon, I completely covered one bedroom wall with drawings of helicopters, rockets, tanks, skyscrapers, and other things that little boys like. When the adults saw it, they found it amusing rather than scolding me, and even praised my drawing skills.

Later on, when I started elementary school, I remember spending entire weekends in my room drawing all day long. I especially enjoyed designing spaceships, including their shapes and structures. My parents were very supportive—they encouraged me by buying whatever drawing paper, pencils, and paints I needed, even though it sometimes affected my studies. Looking back, I realize that my parents' open-minded approach to education from a young age profoundly influenced my entire life.

This is a very broad and complex question, and the standards for defining 'good design' can vary widely depending on the audience, environment, context, and historical background. We won't delve into all of that here. However, if we take a blunt and utilitarian approach, it can be divided into two situations.

For commercial projects, the only criterion is when the client considers it good, it is a 'good design'.

For personal creative work, the only criterion is whether it moves oneself. Notice that I say 'moves' rather than simply 'one thinks it's good.'

In fact, I still keep my first "design" piece on my computer: a fork, a spoon, and a cup.

I majored in Product Design in college. During my freshman year, I studied art and design theory, as well as hand-drawing skills such as sketching, coloring, and industrial drafting. Due to my systematic art training experience since childhood, I found these subjects effortless and thoroughly enjoyable. It wasn't until my sophomore year when I visited my advisor's office to submit some materials that I stumbled upon something that would change my life.

I saw my advisor operating a 3D product design model on the computer screen, which immediately fascinated me. Curiously, I asked my advisor what software it was, and he introduced me to "Rhino". This software opened up a whole new world for me and completely altered the course of my future.

There are so many interesting stories of learning 3D software during my college time that I could talk about for days. I even tried using Rhino to design monster characters (for those who understand...haha). For those learning 3D software nowadays, it’s common to complain about rendering a single frame with 2K resolution, millions of pixels, as well as ray tracing, global illumination (GI), and HDRI techniques for over ten minutes. Those complaints amaze me. Back then, I clearly remember spending an entire afternoon rendering that ugly 640x480 picture with a fork and a cup on the best computer in our dorm building. It was a basic scanline render with no GI, no caustics, no soft shadows—just watching pixels slowly form into an image.

Of course, it’s fantastic that technology has advanced rapidly since then. However, sometimes I do reminisce about the feeling of slowly working on a project, painstakingly watching each pixel emerge from nothing, and spending hours to generate an image from the ground up (or top down). How could I miss it all?

Here are three mottos from our training program, straightforward and based on experience for over a decade:

1. "Less theory, more hands-on practice. “
2. "First solve for existence; then for quality."
3. "Don't overthink; just get it done."