The Melo Faster Tour

Creating a custom illustration for LaMelo Ball’s first European tour with PUMA.

The Melo Faster Tour was a European basketball experience created by PUMA around NBA star LaMelo Ball. The 2023 tour travelled through Milan, Berlin, Paris and London, giving European fans the chance to connect with one of the most exciting personalities of the new NBA generation. For the project, I created a custom TomMillerART illustration of LaMelo, bringing his distinctive personality and style into my own character-driven visual world.

The project

LaMelo Ball has built a strong identity both on and off the court, combining basketball, fashion, sneakers and a highly recognizable personal style. That made him a perfect subject for the TomMillerART approach: the goal was not simply to recreate his appearance, but to capture the attitude and energy associated with LaMelo and translate it into a playful, instantly recognizable character.

The illustration

The character was created in my signature big-head style, simplifying LaMelo’s visual features while keeping the details that make him immediately identifiable. Pose, expression, clothing and basketball elements all became part of the character, an illustration connected to both LaMelo’s personality and the visual energy of the tour.

Basketball, culture and character design

The project is a good example of where TomMillerART fits naturally: at the intersection of sport, entertainment and visual storytelling. Major sporting personalities are already much more than athletes, they have their own style, identity and communities. Character illustration offers another way to translate that identity into something playful, memorable and highly adaptable.

A global basketball personality, reimagined as a TomMillerART character.