One of the standout spots from this year’s crop of Super Bowl commercials was undoubtedly Volkswagen’s Black Beetle which trailed the forthcoming launch of the new 21^st Century VW Beetle. This Super Bowl stunner features an exquisitely animated, striped beetle that dodges natural foes in the woods with the prowess of a 21^st Century VW Beetle in a heart-pounding car chase.

Alongside MJZ director Dante Ariola and agency Deutsch, The Mill London’s team of artists pulled out all the VFX stops to create the realistic CG beetle and its insect friends. Take a look at how they did it in this special Making Of fillm.

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Here you have a fascinating behind-the-scenes video that gives you an up-close and personal look at the making of the entomological, CGI wonderland of the Black Beetle. Tom Bussell and Juan Brockhaus, The Mill Lead 3D Artists on “Beetle”, say they created an animatic from Ariola’s storyboards to provide a blueprint for timings and how the edit would work. They researched not only iconic car chases, but watched documentaries and observed real-life footage of insects to make the spot’s cast as believable as possible.

About The Mill

Based in London, New York and Los Angeles The Mill collaborate on award-winning moving image, design and digital projects for the advertising, film, TV, games and music industries.

Twenty years of innovation has established The Mill as a recognised global brand for creating seamless visual effects, but we are also leaders in design, animation, live action content direction, VFX brand accounts, versioning and global adaptations, digital content creation and distribution. The Mill was founded in 1990 by Robin Shenfield and Pat Joseph, both of whom still lead the group and now have a global team of 500 plus made up of multi-national and home grown talent.

Website: www.themill.com