Which morning vibe are you?
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Nutella launched limited-edition jars in 2020 reflecting various Aussie morning routines, the range consisted of five colours representing Family Hugs, Outdoor Smiles, Home Chill Out, Friend Good Vibes and Together Love!
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At Unbnd, I was responsible for modelling, texturing, and animating five AR scenes for Nutella’s AR Instagram promotion. Nutella customers could bring their morning vibes to life with this interactive instagram AR experience by scanning the QR code on the jar and following the prompts or heading to https://www.nutellavibes.com/.
A smile, a laugh, a family hug, and the kids playing around the breakfast table. It's busy, it's fun, it's loud, and we wouldn't have it any other way. These morning family hugs are the ones that we remember all day.
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Each element was modelled and lit inside 3DS Max. I then baked the lighting into a single unlit diffuse texture using the Arnold renderer. This was actually the first time I had used the Arnold renderer for texture baking! I always liked the way it renders PBR materials and with some trial and error I worked out a workflow for generating PBR maps that I still use to this day.
Good friends, good chats, good times. Catching up over a coffee, sharing stories & positive vibes. The best mornings are the ones we spend together.
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We faced a few challenges here. One of the bigger issues was modeling a low poly bowl of dried oats that would drop individual oats into the bowl as it filled up. I made this work by having an oat mass low poly mesh that was scaled up as the individual oats fell through the bowl and were culled with a render mask. It all moves so quickly that your brain fills in the blanks and thinks the bowl “fills up” with oats.
The other issue we tackled was that the particle emitter in Spark AR used to create the floating emojis had VERY basic controls and in the end, I used animated looping emoji models in the scene for a better result.
Breakfast in bed? Or together around the table? However you enjoy it, a lovingly prepared breakfast for two makes the perfect start to any day.
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This was the experience that gave me one of those “oh wow!” moments after it launched, my wife and I were walking around Coles and suddenly there was my artwork on display!
“Rise and shine, relax and chill. Leave the pj's on, grab a book, a cup of tea, sit back, relax, and enjoy a slow start to the day. The best mornings are the ones you don't need to rush.”
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I loved how this layout turned out! The client was adamant on having the glass tea cup in the scene and I was never completely happy with the glass like effect we had in Spark AR. It did have reflections we could emulate however without being able to do effective refraction, the glass looked less like glass and more like a ghost glass.
Wake at dawn, head out for a walk, a swim, a ride, or a surf and top it off with breakfast in the great outdoors. It's energizing, it's revitalizing and puts a smile on our face for the rest of the day.
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Trying to capture a serene picnic environment, this was one of the first experiences I started to work on. This was the test bed I used to refine our photoreal workflow for all other scenes.
I experimented with baking out the shadows for each element and multiplying them, one on top of another, fading each image in as elements popped into existence to create the illusion of the lighting updating without having dynamic lighting in Spark AR.
I had an indescribable attachment to this project. The techniques I learnt through the creation of these experiences formed the basis of much of my baking workflows today. I would like to thank Unbnd Canberra for this incredible opportunity!