This animated illustration is a concept for an imaginary collaboration between POPMART and me. For the past year, I’ve been a huge blind box enjoyer, and POPMART has always been my go-to for unique charms and figures. I love their brand, so when given the chance to create an advertisement for a dream collaboration with a company that truly resonates with me, I had to choose them.

This project was also my attempt at creating my own blind box series, one centered around different sides of myself. For the three designs I developed, I started by using existing blind box figures as inspiration before sketching in Procreate. I created a base model and experimented with different hairstyles and outfits. Once the sketches were finalized, I moved on to line art and solid colors. I typically stick to solid colors since I add shading and shine later through layer styles in After Effects.

After exporting my illustration as a PDF into After Effects, I organized all my layers (renaming, adjusting anchor points, parenting elements, creating track mattes, and masking as needed). Once everything was set, I began compositing and animating. To make the characters feel fluid and alive, I used the Wave Warp and Puppet Tool effects. Wave Warp worked especially well for the hair, though it required a delicate balance to keep the motion feeling natural. My favorite part to animate, as always, was the faces, making them glance up, down, and around while adding blinks always gives me a little sense of accomplishment, even with simple techniques.

Each character in the series represents a different part of me:

• Heart (red and pink) symbolizes my high school years. I actually had that anime-inspired haircut and rocked it, but it was also a tough time in my life, which is why she doesn’t look too happy.

  
  

• Bloom (pink and purple) represents my growth. Like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon, or a flower blooming, she symbolizes how I’m evolving and working toward feeling truly accomplished one day.

  
  

• Jelly (blue and purple) reflects my years as a swimmer and my bouncy, fluid nature.