From Background Artist to AR Storyteller: How Artist Alba Marín Coves Animates Her Artworks with AR
See how artist Alba uses Kivicube to transform a static illustration into an interactive AR experience. Explore the magic of augmented reality in art.
When you think about films and cartoons, you might remember the beloved characters, memorable scenes, and emotional moments that stayed with you long after the story ended. For artist Alba Marín Coves, it is the cherished images, memories, and inspirations she collects over time that fuel her creative process. Now, Alba has built a diverse portfolio of illustrations and is exploring animation as part of her creative journey.
In this interview, we’ll explore Alba’s artistic journey and discover how she expanded her creative practice by combining illustration with AR technology.
Lifelong Love for Animation
Alba Marín Coves is a background designer and visual development artist based in Madrid, Spain. She moved to Madrid to study fine arts, specializing in landscape painting before discovering animation and the creative opportunities it offered.
As someone who has loved animation, Alba believes films have the power to move people and always keeps animation close to her heart. She never stopped watching cartoons and considers animation one of her main sources of artistic inspiration. As Alba explains:
“It has been my favorite medium of expression since I was a kid, and I feel inspired and grateful for all the people who worked hard on the shows and films I watched as a kid.”
Draw Inspiration from Nature
Apart from watching movies and cartoons, Alba enjoys plein-air painting and sketching as part of her creative practice. She likes to sketch whatever surrounds her, carrying a sketchbook in her backpack wherever she goes. When outdoors, she often immerses herself in nature and observes the details around her. And while hiking, she enjoys exploring local birdlife and landscapes, which provide further inspiration for her artwork.
This habit has influenced her artwork, with natural landscapes becoming recurring themes throughout her creative process. Rather than simply reproducing what she sees, Alba uses sketching as a way to observe, understand, and interpret her surroundings. Her pieces present how everyday interactions with nature can become an ongoing source of artistic inspiration.
Make Illustrations More Interactive with AR
To explore new ways of storytelling, Alba tried to integrate AR with one of her most popular illustrations. In the artwork, a black cat is drinking water on a desk that also holds books, a pen holder, and a potted plant. She then enhanced the illustration with AR animations, transforming the static artwork into an interactive experience.
Step 1. Select one of her illustrations as the target image, then export each element as a separate transparent PNG file.
Step 2. Open and log in to Kivicube, then create a new “Image AR”.
Step 3. Upload the prepared transparent PNG files to the platform. Drag and drop the assets into the editor, then adjust them with the Transform tools.
Step 4. Then add animations to make the assets appear in turn. The cat in the AR scene can playfully flick its tongue and wiggle its ears like a real-life cat.
Step 5. Scan the QR code and the target image to explore how Alba makes her illustration come alive with AR animations.
Why Kivicube Helps Creators Like Alba Bring Their Ideas to Life
“It was a nice, intuitive experience for me to create an AR scene with Kivicube. I like the website's interface and design, and it’s very easy to use. I have never tried AR before, and it was pretty fun to play around with the animations and finally see an illustration come to life. ”
As Alba mentioned in the interview, Kivicube is a beginner-friendly WebAR platform that helps creators of all skill levels create immersive AR experiences. Beyond its simplicity, what makes it especially useful for artists is the flexible layer system and multiple animation options.
By arranging assets across multiple layers and applying different animation effects, artists can unleash their imagination to the fullest and bring their creative ideas to life. Additionally, the newly launched keyframe animations feature enables users to customize the motion path of each asset to create smoother animations.
With no need for downloading an app, the AR experiences generated by Kivicube can be shared across sites and platforms with simple QR codes and links. Such a convenience also encourages more artists to give it a try.
Q&A With Alba Marín Coves
Q1: Hi Alba, would you like to tell us about yourself?
I am a background designer and visual development artist based in Madrid. I also created ToonMates with my colleagues, a non-profit organization where we organize masterclasses, workshops, and a monthly drink-and-draw event called BeerMates.
Q2: Your work is painterly and observational. What inspires your creation?
I have loved watching movies and cartoons since I was a kid, and they have always been a major source of inspiration for me. Beyond that, sketching, mountain climbing, and learning about the birds and nature in my area provide me with endless inspiration for creating art.
Q3: Since you were new to AR, what was the learning experience like with Kivicube?
I like the intuitive interface and easy-to-follow features. It makes my AR creation smooth and without difficulties. I had never tried AR before, but this experience was simple and interesting. I could experiment with animations and bring my illustration to life.
Q4: Would you like to recommend Kivicube to other illustrators?
Absolutely yes! I feel like everyone can make a simple AR animation with this platform, and it is definitely worth learning. It is especially useful for people who are curious about 3D or want to create something original for marketing materials or a business card. It can be used for many things, and it’s very fun!
