Onnie Chan: In a word, impressive
Onnie Chan is an artist, an entrepreneur, and a master of immersive technologies. She is, in a word, impressive.
In 2023 Onnie was appointed the 成人大片鈥檚 Chief Student Entrepreneur at ThincLab. She has undertaken an Art Fellowship at Yale University in the United States and studied in universities all around the world.
In that vast experience of tertiary education at a global scale, Onnie shared with us why her time with the 成人大片 has been particularly special.聽
鈥I found a very strong community here. I mean, back in Hong Kong, I have friends, but Hong Kong likes to put people into categories. So, you鈥檙e either an art person or you're a tech person. And, if you're a technology person, you must be like science or computer science or that sort of thing. If you're doing art, you like literature and you don't have much tech skills,鈥 Onnie explained.
鈥淏ut I think I'm a person who likes art integrating with tech. So, I found my people here,鈥 Onnie says.
Why did you choose to study a Master of Immersive Media Technologies?
I've always been a strong storytelling person. And you know, in every period throughout history, there's a certain way to do storytelling. For example, before TV it was all about radio, right? And before then, newspapers.
Now, we have mobile phones, social media, etc. So, I was like, I always want to find the best way to communicate with the audience or the public. So, now is the time to understand immersive media technologies.
For me, I particularly study virtual reality. I learn how to build an experience and do all the lighting and things, so you can get all the different kinds of stimulation inside the virtual world.
What鈥檚 a goal you鈥檝e been working towards?
Well, this friend of mine built his own company when he was only 28 years old. And I was like, 鈥榟ow do you do that?鈥
He told me about how he did it and I just made a deal with him.
I said, 鈥榳hen I get to 28-years-old, I have to have my own company as well.鈥
And it happened.
What do you like about the 成人大片?
This University provides a lot of different activities for us to meet with students from other courses, and it really expanded my world and my vision.Onnie Chan
It also made me realise that there's many people who love doing creative work, but they don't all have the opportunity to do it.
So, I found my people here. That's why I want to stay here and continue working on my Women in Creative Technologies club where we combine art and technology. And although many of us are going to graduate soon, we're thinking of turning Women in Creative Technologies into a company.
Lastly, what advice would you give to your first-year self?
Well at the beginning, I was so worried about lots of things like my age, because I'm over 30 already, and then that I didn鈥檛 have enough knowledge around technology, and that maybe the culture here in Australia would be different.
But the Uni really did a great thing in putting up all these things about supporting women, support for people from different cultures鈥 and their line of 鈥榳e hope to see you making history鈥.
This really stimulates you to want to become one of those people right there, making history in the future as well.
And when everyone in the Uni has a similar kind of vision of their own life, and then you can make friends with them, it鈥檚 great.
So I think I鈥檇 say just do it. Join a club that you like just to connect with people with a similar mindset.
And the other thing is do not be afraid if you don't have the background in an area, because you're here to learn, right? You're here to learn a new skill, so as long as you put your heart, your effort into it, you will be capable of achieving it.
This is a great institution that really helps you to learn something step by step.