Digital Designer Tejasi Thool Will Seek Master's in Medical Illustration After Time at NJIT

Tejasi Thool, a Hasbrouck, New Jersey native, looks forward to her next step in her career after completing her digital design studies at New Jersey Institute of Technology’s Hillier College of Architecture and Design. 

Her next move will be to get a master’s in medical illustration. “It’s like medical diagrams, and sometimes you see them on Instagram or TikTok, an animation of a surgery that doctors do,” said Thool. “I love being an artist, and my parents always wanted me to go into the medical field.”

During her time at NJIT, Thool joined NJIT SIGGRAPH. As an international organization, SIGGRAPH aims to bring together the best technologies and digital designers the world has to offer. In her last year, Thool acted as a marketing manager in the club. 

“Being part of SIGGRAPH has been really good for me,” said Thool. “I went to Vancouver two years ago; it was a pretty good opportunity. I got to meet a lot of people from all over the world. 

“The city was really nice, and I got to see different companies. See what they do, how they do it and behind-the-scenes access. I remember I went to a Disney showing of a movie that they made, and they did the behind the scenes for that and explained the technology behind it.”

Among her favorite projects, Thool highlights two: “Chimera” and “Skin and Bones.” 

Thool completed “Chimera” for a collaborative studio, in which she worked with a digital and interior designer. “I made a comic, and the interior designer made all the backgrounds. My other partner made the trailer, and then the interior designer made the backgrounds for those as well, that was a cool project.”

This past semester, she made “Skin and Bones”, a trailer for a game in 2D animation. In the game, she included characters she created in her character design class. 

She thanks her professors for helping her skills in areas like 3D modeling. “Most of the professors have been really helpful and really great. There's one that I've had several times throughout these four years, Miguel Rodriguez.

“He just knows so much about everything, he's been really helpful.”

She will miss her classmates, as their work inspired her every day. “I would say watching my classmates, they make really cool stuff. We all do different things. There's like about 15, 16 of us in a studio, and so I've known them for about as long as I've been at NJIT, and they all have different specialties. 

“There's somebody who likes cars and photography, and someone else who likes 3D. There's a really good 2D animator in my class, there's another person who does like really good realism. Getting to be with my classmates and seeing what they make inspires me to do what I want, and see how good I can be compared to them.”