lbella | M-GIRL

M-GIRL

The relaunch collection I made for Virtual-K that features a new original character I designed.

This is related to Virtual-K, which you can learn more about in a separate portfolio entry here.

And yes, everything you see here (with the exclusion of the sticker club offers) are available for purchase in my store.

M-GIRL is a character I came up with in the tail end of 2020. I became absolutely obsessed with this idea of making a monster girl character, but not your average, run-of-the-mill monster girl. I wanted to create a character who has been brought back from the dead in a very peculiar way: her soul has been put into a strange amalgamation of a bright neon green mannequin, a microwave, and a neon pink skull.

She doesn't know where she is or what's happened to her but her story starts with her running through the streets from something while she's covered in blood. Onlookers in the city witness her and are immediately alarmed and start contacting authorities. M-GIRL is immediately lost and misunderstood as she barrels through the streets looking for a place to hide.

The very first sketches I ever made of M-GIRL back in October 2020. Later on I did some painting practices on these to see how I'd like these colors on her.

Posters

Poster thumbnails.

I knew right off the bat after sketching this character I wanted to make posters of her to sell in my store which I was already planning to relaunch in March 2021. So I did a whole bunch of thumbnails of potential poster ideas and was really drawn to 5 ideas in particular.

The first starred thumbnail in the top row and the first starred thumbnail in the bottom row were the ideas I was the most drawn to, so I decided to go ahead and make those a reality.

The first M-GIRL poster design. I'm absolutely in love with this one. It's probably one of my favorite pieces I've made in all of 2021.

The second M-GIRL poster design. I love the mystery and the glitch effects that I have going on this one.

I had a specific look in mind while making these posters; I wanted them to look bright and almost as if they were glowing, an almost ethereal glow. I also wanted them to look a bit glitchy so I went in and made some of these glitch effects myself. I am thrilled with how they came out.

The extra fun part about these poster designs is that they're not just regular posters; they're both holographic posters. So in person they have an extra wow factor when the light hits it.

They're absolutely gorgeous.

Stickers

The main sticker for March 2021 sticker club. (tier 1)

One of the M-GIRL stickers released in Virtual-K.

The additional sticker for March 2021 sticker club (tier 3).

Another sticker released in Virtual-K.

Of course, since this was the reopening of Virtual-K with my newly established sticker club, I wanted to have the March offerings for sticker club celebrate this fact. So I had 2 stickers available at different tiers for sticker club, and 2 stickers that were part of the general collection that was released in Virtual-K.

I think they all came out fantastic but I'm absolutely smitten with how the main sticker club sticker came out. It's so gorgeous and vibrant in person.

M-GIRL T-Shirt Design

The M-GIRL t-shirt design was another design that I absolutely adored but I was very hesitant about its outcome because this was the first time I've ever made a t-shirt design with the intent to print it out and put it up for sale.

After receiving the test print I got for myself in the mail, I fell in love instantly. I was so happy that it printed out so well, especially since it was a design that had a lot of different things going on.

In the M-GIRL universe, she's misunderstood as some weird mutant freak who looks incredibly dangerous and nothing but trouble. So I had that in mind while making this design, having a frustrated M-GIRL be surrounded by exclamations and insults. I love this design and I love it even more on the shirt.

Illustration

I've been drawing since I could pick up a pencil, but the past 10+ years are when I really started to seriously study it and improve. I'm very interested in character design and character based illustration. My fondness for big bold colors and fun concepts follows me here as well.

The Halloween Spirit 2021

A project where I redesigned an old original character from 2013 and breathed new life into her in 2021 via painting.

#Mermay Day 15

The 15th painting in the #Mermay2021 series.

Swamp Circus

A cute print of a painting that was offered in the April 2021 sticker club.

#Mermay Day 9

I participated in #Mermay2021 which was a challenge to draw mermaid related paintings every day for the month of May. A good handful of these I liked enough to include in my portfolio. This is the 9th painting in the series.