Jorge has been sharing truly inspiring tutorials with the Codrops community. His work consistently explores the creative edges of interactive design, blending motion, detail, and intent. We’re excited to highlight his journey and favorite works in this Developer Spotlight!
Hi, my name is Jorge Toloza. I’m a Creative Developer and Co-Founder at DDS Studio. I’ve been coding for about 10 years, working with agencies around the world and also freelancing.
Here are some of my favorite projects:
This is my 2024 portfolio, designed and coded by me. I wanted the homepage to be very simple and clean—just a gallery showcasing all the projects, with the logo centered and accompanied by some tags. There’s a subtle magnetic interaction on the project thumbnails when you hover over them. For the archive page, I wanted to experiment with typography and mouse interaction, so I used an SVG and morphed its shape based on the mouse position.
The design was created by Margot Studio, with the central concept being the mirror. Pance developed that idea through the branding, and I translated it into code—mainly using mask and clip-path techniques.
This is one of my favorite projects. The design was led by Contra Studio in collaboration with Silvana Aponte. The layout was quite clean, which gave me room to explore motion and microinteractions.
My friends at EMME & CO invited me to collaborate on this beautiful project. I loved the layouts and the overall concept. They had some ideas for the motion but also gave me the freedom to experiment and explore creatively.
This was a collaboration with Replica Studio. The layout is grid-based, with videos hosted on Vimeo and the rest of the assets managed through Prismic.
This is a portfolio I created for my sister, Diana Toloza — a Developer, Photographer, and Fashion Designer. The gallery interaction was built using CSS transformations and clip-paths.
And finally my previous portfolio
About me
I studied Systems Engineering at the University of Magdalena in Santa Marta, Colombia. The program was heavily focused on calculus, physics, and programming—mainly related to backend development. However, I quickly realized that I was more drawn to visual and motion-based work. I began teaching myself, practicing, and building small projects. After a couple of years, I was invited to join the Young Jury at Awwwards, where I learned a lot about the industry and discovered an incredible community of talented people, including Luis Bizarro, Niccolò Miranda, Alex Tkachev, Isabel Moranta, and many others.
I collaborated for several years with Elkanodata, where I had the opportunity to work on projects for EBU, IFAD, the United Nations, UN Women, and other organizations. It was an amazing team, and I learned a lot from my friend and colleague Julio Cesar Almeida.
Last year, I started DDS Studio with my sister, Diana Toloza — a multidisciplinary studio focused on design, development, and clothing. We’re based in Medellín, Colombia, but work with clients worldwide.
When it comes to my stack, I enjoy working with Prismic.io and Nuxt.js, though it really depends on the type of project. Personally, I prefer working without frameworks or libraries—just vanilla JavaScript—but sometimes libraries can save a lot of time, so it’s important to know how to use them effectively.
Final thoughts
Finally, I want to say thank you to Codrops, Manoela, and everyone behind the articles and tutorials. I learned so much from this site when I was starting out in the industry, and I continue to find inspiration in every new post shared here.