Daniel Ray

Hi Jaiden! My name is Daniel Martinez and I’ve been a subscriber of yours for about 6 years now. Watching you has been inspiring and motivates me to keep pushing forward with my art dreams! I am 21 years old and currently a student at the University of Texas at Arlington in the sculpture program getting my bachelors degree. I am set to graduate in spring 2026 and I plan to go on to Grad school in the fall of 2026. My dream job is to work for LAIKA studios as a stop motion animation artist. Art started for me when I was quite young, seeing comic books and wanting to do something like that one day. I started art school at the age of 12 when I went to a small school in Grand Prairie Texas called Grand Prairie Fine Arts Academy. It was a public school but you had to audition to get in. I auditioned and was admitted! I stayed there for 6 years until I graduated from high school in 2021. During that time I learned a lot and became even more passionate about it. Eventually I fell in love with animation and then stop motion animation after watching films like Coraline and Paranorman. I went to college in 2021 and have paid for everything out of pocket with part time jobs. I had help with financial Aid but still paid for the majority of it on my own. After last semester, I stopped getting my grants and now only have access to loans. So now I’m really on my own. Every semester it’s anxiety inducing thinking about how I’ll make the money for every payment that’s due. To finish paying for this semester, I work Monday - Friday from 3:30am -12pm before class as basically a janitor at a gym. It’s been hard but I’ve been able to get this far. According to the tuition estimator on the UTA website, the remaining cost of my tuition would be about 11k. I only have a couple semesters left and It would be such an honor and a dream to be able to finish the rest of my undergrad without having to carry the financial burden. I would be able to put all my energy into making art and getting a nice portfolio ready for Grad school instead of working everyday to make sure I can make my payments. I understand there’s many others who will be applying for this opportunity, and I just wanted to say the impact you’re having on young artists is astronomical. Thank you for giving small artists like me a chance. 

      -Sincerely, Daniel Martinez