I’m working my typical day and the word came down that MVP HQ is experimenting with a new & improved Eclipse Glow blend of plastic with overmolds. With the recent success of the Reactor mold; both ideas hit me at once and we pitched the idea to try Reactors & see how they would mold up. The initial idea for a Glow Reactor Special Edition came in the form of glowing toxic material and powerplants.
Some say it’s not always good to roll with your first idea. We marinated a bit on the qualities of the plastic and used them to our strengths. The natural look of the Eclipse 2.0 blend in the daytime gives off a milky white/greenish appeal. I felt using this opportunity to honor the late Marie Curie and her life as a scientific pioneer. She would be the first woman to win multiple Nobel Prizes in both sciences. She’s also the first female featured in MVP’s Limited and Special Edition scientific line of stamps. We use this platform to give nods to some of the notable humans that have contributed to the world of science. Her magnificent and intense story led MVP down the path to honor her in this stamp.
While diving in and reading about Marie Curie; I jotted a few notes that would aid in design cues and decisions while building the vector art. Marie and Pierre found and named a new element called Radium that was 4x more radioactive than Uranium itself. Long story short, She and Pierre would take the next 4 years to process an incredible 10 tons of pitchblende down to 1/10th of Radium Chloride residue. She was able to give an atomic mass of Radium of 225.9 (226) and place it correctly in the Periodic table. I thought that was a pretty significant number that took an immense amount of work to arrive at. I would later use that number of radial lines from the discs’ center.
I used a variety of images of her from both her early years as a college student and those of her later years to compose a set of thumbnailed ideas. There are era-appropriate shapes and symmetry to really help merge the unique plastic color. MVP stamping and marketing worked in conjunction to test and make the transparent foil worked with the artwork. The molecular compound of Radium is featured as a clear holofoil backdrop that appears a muted grey when illuminated in the darkness. The new 2.0 Eclipse is so bright that the white foil we used allows light to soak through giving even more depth in the darkness. Marie’s pose is intense as in her work. Time is not wasted. Electrometer and infamous MVP shaped beaker are placed behind her. In her lower pocket is a glass tube of Radium. She was known to carry it around in the lab; as she wasn’t aware of the effects of radiation.
In the end, it’s the overall goal to honor a legend in the science field with tact and class. Use the plastic qualities as we did in the 2018 Am Worlds ”Queen Charlotte” and make it feel like it belongs in the lineage of MVP stamps created to honor those featured. We felt as a Marketing Department that this stamp did just that. These Special Edition Marie Curie Eclipse Reactors will be available at most major MVP Disc Sports dealers for a small amount of time. Be sure to inquire about them before they’re gone for good!
