Hands shaky and sweaty, BYU senior Catherine Boyack cleared her dry mouth. She lifted her flute and played. She had been working for months to polish her piece, but she knew it wasn’t her best performance. She left the stage of the convention hall defeated, believing she wouldn’t make it to the final round of the biggest competition of her career.

Vai Sikahema discusses his journey from rejection to the Alumni Achievement Award in the School of Communications.

“Forever, women have been expected to be a certain way, look a certain way. I know for me … I was never the girly-girl. When I first started touring, I didn’t even wear makeup — I wore jeans. … And then I started being told I needed to look different because I was going to be on TV. … All of that starts getting put in your head and if you don’t have a strong enough sense of what you believe or who you are, you can easily get worried by it — I was for a certain amount of time.” That was just one of many topics Caillat addressed during the hourlong conversation at BYU's Harris Fine Arts Center. The singer touched on a variety of subjects ranging from working with Jason Mraz to overcoming stage fright to her surprising — and initially unwanted — rise to fame. As Caillat puts it, finding success was “accidental.” For starters, not many people can write a hit song in 20 minutes. But the words came out fast, and when her friend posted a demo recording of 'Bubbly' and a few other songs to MySpace — a platform Caillat had never even heard of — popularity came almost as fast. Caillat was offered a record deal, and those demos became her debut album in 2007. Read more at Deseret News’ website. Photo Credit: Alyssa Lyman.

BYU art professor Joe Ostraff shares his presentation “We Breathe the Same Air” at the November Faith and Works Lecture Series.

Martha Graham Intensive Offers Both Professional and Creative Boosts to Dancers

It’s a good year for BYU’s Center for Animation: in May BYU animation students won E3’s College Game Competition, and now BYU tops the Animation Career Review’s ranking of animation schools with Bachelor of Science programs. BYU’s animation program is comprised of students in both the animation track (BFA) and the computer science animation emphasis (BS). Before they graduate, students work either on the animated film or the video game that is produced each year. The animation students typically focus on design, while the computer science students focus on special effects. Read the rest of the story on news.byu.edu.

'Coco' Director Lee Unkrich Speaks to BYU Animation and Media Arts Students

The College of Fine Arts and Communications will feature NBC morning news anchor Vai Sikahema on October 11 at 11 a.m. in the Madsen Recital Hall in the Harris Fine Arts Center. His lecture is titled “Denied Admission to Alum of the Year: My BYU Journey”. Vai Sikahema played football at BYU and graduated in Broadcast Journalism before becoming the first Tongan drafted into the NFL. Sikahema, former running back and kick returner, ranks first among the NFL’s all-time career leaders in number of punt returns and second in return yardage after his time with the Cardinals, Packers and Eagles. Sikahema has since worked as a morning news anchor at NBC. He has earned three Mid-Atlantic Emmy Awards for his work in local television and is featured in the Philadelphia Broadcast Pioneers’ Hall of Fame. Sikahema’s influence in the Philadelphia area was instrumental in helping The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints get the Philadelphia Temple approved. Date: Thursday, October 11, 2018 Time: 11 a.m. Location: Madsen Recital Hall HFAC Admission: Free, open to the public

BYU artists take on the Inktober challenge by doing one ink drawing a day for the entire month of October

Communication Arts recognizes the MODE 2017 opening titles, a video by Brent Barson that highlights the technological and stylistic capacity of modern motion design. The Design Annual issue of Communication Arts magazine recognizes the best in visual art across many industries. Though Department of Design Professor Brent Barson has been featured before, he’s happy to be recognized by the publication once again. “It feels really good,” Barson said. “It is tough to get into, there are around 4,000 entrants. It’s very gratifying, makes the effort worth it.” Communication Arts honored Barson for his work on the MODE Conference 2017 opening titles video. MODE, or Motion Design Education, commissioned Barson’s work. MODE has regularly scheduled conventions and continues to “encourage, share and help motion design by providing a platform for research pedagogy,” as stated by the organization’s website. Though the organization was originally founded by three motion design educators, it has since quadrupled in size, with Barson being among the professors who have joined on. “I attended the second MODE they ever had and I asked to get involved, so I was one of the six founding members for the third,” Barson said. “It’s really exciting to see it growing.” The video has a distinct aesthetic. Though the colors were decided by the conference’s color scheme, the rest of the video is almost entirely the product of Barson (the music was done by Micah Dahl Anderson). “The project was born of my academic leave from BYU,” Barson said. “It was a deep dive into this 3D software, Octane Render. What was exciting about it to me is that it can render completely photorealistic scenes. I thought, 'That’s an interesting idea, to create reality while also filming surreality.'” A frame from Barson’s MODE 2017 opening titles.

BYU students have set up an online information hub, organizing the flood of information on two major wildfires that have chased more than 6,000 Utah residents from their homes in recent days. Less than 24 hours after its creation, the Utah County Fire Relief Website had received more than 15,000 visitors. That’s about one new visitor every second. Y Digital Agency Manager Adam Durfee teamed up with BYU students and local volunteers to build a central hub for real-time updates on the Pole Creek and Bald Mountain fires burning just outside Spanish Fork, Utah. Finish reading 'New Y Digital website streamlines Utah wildfire information' at universe.byu.edu.

BYU students, alumni, faculty and UTA personnel cooperate to create raised awareness of Utah’s air pollution situation through dance.