I was trusted with the character design and development of Mari, a digital advisor created for Mercado Pago Brazil. To mark the 30th anniversary of the Real, Mercado Pago launched the highest-yielding account in the country. And who better to communicate that to Brazilians than Mari, the iconic figure featured on Brazil’s banknotes.
I was in charge of the full art direction for the project, overseeing the character production pipeline and final animation.
Produced in 2024, long before character reference tools for consistent animation were available, I developed a custom pipeline that combined Unreal Engine’s Metahuman with AI post-production. This approach ensured a consistent and expressive character capable of acting as a financial advisor within the Mercado Pago AR experience.
The pipeline allowed for direct control over animation at the keyframe level, making it possible to fine-tune movement and Portuguese lip sync to meet client expectations. Once approved, we used Leonardo and Runway’s toolsets to apply the final layer of AI-driven realism.
Exceeding client expectations and delivering strong results in earned media and new user adoption for Mercado Pago in Brazil, I was then trusted with directing the campaign’s video case for award consideration in the PR category.