Rija is a passionate and curious learner with a talent for 2D illustration and digital art and skills in graphic, UI, and UX design.
Rija holds an undergraduate degree in Visual Communication Design from the National College of Arts in Lahore, Pakistan. There, she learned about the foundations and basics of visual design, branding, and advertisement.
Having a massive interest in fantasy, animated films, philosophy, and psychology, initially she started digital illustration as a hobby. But after graduation, she pursued her hobby as a profession and started working as a digital illustrator for a children’s book publishing house.
During this time she began exploring the realms of UX and UI design and was quite fascinated by it. The merge of design and human-computer interaction, the creative yet logical problem solving, and the idea of creating a digital solution for the masses was too compelling to pass. This pushed her into quitting her job at the publishing house and working as a product designer for the next 4 years. Since then, she has designed several mobile apps, websites, and web apps for startups around the world.
The most noteworthy project is the website design for a startup called We Over I. For this, she had full creative freedom to create a modern and quirky website that reflected the startup’s values using her design and illustration skills. She was also responsible for managing the content and development teams and making sure the final deliverable was a close match to the prototype.
Parallel to this, she continued working on freelance illustration projects with organizations like WWF Pakistan, Pepsi, Bayan (a Pakistani rock band), Rose Petal Pakistan, Pakistan Cricket Board, and a few more.
Here at the MDM, the primary goal for Rija is to find creative ways to merge her illustration and UI/UX design learnings with game design. Being a consistent learner, she is keen to learn all about game design, software and tools, and how gaming could connect to her current expertise. She is looking to create projects in a collaborative environment with people from diverse backgrounds and talents and believes this would help her in expanding her soft skills.
In her free time, you can find her reading, making art, struggling with playing guitar, rewatching Stranger Things, or playing video games. She is a huge Studio Ghibli nerd and hopes to collaborate with Miyazaki one day.
She is fluent in both Urdu and English.
Projects
Skills
- 2D Designer
- Concept Artist
- UI Designer