In this humorous spot for Toshiba, director Ulf Johansson explores the idea of the butterfly effect as the unplugging of an ethernet connection engenders a chain reaction of events across the universe from the downing of powerlines to the failure of a satellite orbiting the Earth.
Responsible for the satellite scene, the Smoke & Mirrors CG team created all of the elements in the space environment in which the satellite sparks and fails, causing a driver's GPS system to go haywire.
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| Full Satellite Model |
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| Satellite Model |
The first order of business for the team was to design and model the satellite. Using multiple references, the team created a satellite to be animated and composited into the space environment overlooking earth.
With a completed satellite model on hand, the team then generated the Earth background environment. Developing this background image from scratch, the team layered several render passes to compose a believable remote view of the luminous planet.
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| Earth Background Render Passes & Final Composite |
Utilizing Nuke to composite the entire scene, the team married the Earth background with the several passes used to render the satellite animation to create the short clip of the failing satellite.
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| Satellite Render Passes & Final Composite |
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| Nuke Render Tree |
