Nerds Gummy Clusters
Origin Story
Director Liam Chapple - Carbon
Agency Ferrara

Case Study

Carbon

  • Design & Animation Carbon
  • Director Liam Chapple  
  • Executive Producer Gretchen Praeger 
  • Senior Producer Sue McNamara  
  • Head of CG Frank Grecco  
  • VFX Supervisor Blake Druery  
  • Lead Designer Yongho Kim
  • Asset Lead Will Moody
  • CG FX Artists Francois Duchesneau, Jamie German  
  • Designer Matt Beharry  
  • Styleframes Yongho Kim, Dorian Gourg 

External

  • Agency Ferrara
  • Director Joey Rath
  • Brand Manager Jenny Chen
  • Associate Brand Manager Aditya Negi
  • Senior Creative Director Alberto Zapata
  • Producer Britt Drouet
  • Creative Director Adam “Nev” Nevler
  • Editorial Company Whitehouse Post
  • Editor Lizzy Graham
  • Sound Design Wave
  • Sound Design Isaac Matus
  • Producer Eleni Giannopoulos

Directed by Carbon’s Liam Chapple, we created a whole universe of deliciousness in this juicy new campaign for Nerds Gummy Clusters.

“The brief from the amazing team at Ferrara was simple,” explains Chapple. “Build a compelling narrative around the creation of Nerds Gummy Clusters, one of the US’s biggest selling candies. So, we put on our creative caps and came up with a genesis story that took inspiration from superheroes, space exploration, and the Big Bang. Flavor and textural appeal were high on the list of must-haves. We kept these front of mind as we developed a storyline to get those taste buds tingling.”

Enjoy the director’s cut above, and get a peek into our process below.

From Space Exploration to Design Exploration

With our theme of ‘genesis and formation’ in place, our team set about designing each stage of the Nerds Gummy Clusters origin story in a stylized and oh so beautified way.









Motion Tests, Modelling & FX

Throughout our partnership with Ferrara, we got to know this tasty product inside and out.

It started with a tour of the Nerds factory in Chicago. “Seeing how the real deals are made was hugely illuminating,” continues Chapple. “It’s a complex process over several floors and it smelled incredible, as you can imagine.”

“We worked closely with Ferrara’s internal marketing team, every step on the way. This gave us crucial insight into how the brand and product are positioned, and fed into our design and storytelling process.”


“When it came time to build our designs in CG, the team wanted a realistic representation of Nerds Gummy Clusters, so consumers know what to expect. We incorporated tiny imperfections to make the CG look real and delicious.”

“We discussed juicy details like the exact viscosity, color, and movement of both the gummy center and the individual baby nerds. These were particulary useful in the animation and FX stages.”




 

Final Film & Easter Eggs

Easter Eggs in a candy commercial?! Oh yeah, we did it. Watch out for nods to some of our favorite space themed films.

“The crystals were inspired by Superman’s crystal cave in the original Christopher Reeve film, and the Nerds landing on the gummy towards the end was inspired by Deep Impact!” Ends Chapple.

Big thanks to Ferrara for bringing us into this sweet Nerds universe.