Skate or die, dude! That was the mantra The Mill adopted when BBDO Atlanta approached us to create a fully CG commercial promoting Pantech's sponsorship of the Dew Tour. Creative Director Mario Stipinovich, Design Director Jeff Stevens and Art Director Emmett Dzieza imagined a world that blended painterly illustration with a deconstructed, geometric sensibility. The Mill team collaborated with the agency's creatives to invent a wonderfully stylized and unique world in which the handheld device ollies, rail-slides and catches air through three lush Dew Tour landscapes.

During the first week of production our editor Ryan McKenna - a veteran skater himself - scoured dozens of skateboarding, snowboarding, and surfing videos for inspiration. 3D Animators Ross Scroble and Sam Crees translated real life moves into tricks for the Crossover, which allowed the team to lock an edit in the first week of production.

While the animators were working on the shots, our designers and illustrators created the environments, drawing from cubist paintings to develop three colorful and abstract worlds. "The objective was to create three different environments, each one blending into the following," notes Dzieza. "It had to be colorful, punchy and engaging." Lead Designer Brian Louie brought his signature design and illustration expertise to the table to create a beautiful triptych of worlds.

Once the overall look and animation were locked, the spot was brought to life by our design team in Cinema4d and composited in After Effects, which allowed for continuous fine-tuning of the designs.  Fancy particle effects for the crest of the wave, snow splashes and skate sparks were the icing on the cake. Producer Emily Branham navigated the complex roads through all the departments and wrangled, as always, the extremely tight deadline.