Discover the Gut Microbiome
Working with agency MBC, SuperBlimp ran the post-production and VFX for Protexin's Discover the Gut Microbiome campaign, a hybrid live-action and CG film built around a single visual idea: take the audience inside the unseen world of a pet's gut and make it look like a place worth visiting. The film follows a spaniel running through a vivid microbiome forest, surrounded by floating bacteria, microbes, and luminous flora that turn an invisible biological environment into a cinematic landscape.Working from live-action plates shot in Cape Town with director Roshan Kapoor and Gavin Schneider Productions, SuperBlimp handled CG environment design, microbe creature design, lighting, full VFX integration, colour, and finish.
The approach
The brief called for a film that would communicate the role of probiotics in pet health, but the creative challenge was much more interesting than that: how do you design an invisible biological environment in a way that feels like somewhere a viewer would actually want to be? The microbiome of a dog’s gut isn’t a place anyone has ever seen, which means the design had no real-world reference to work from and no audience expectation to lean on. We approached it as a worldbuilding exercise. The microbiome became an alien forest landscape, full of luminous flora, drifting microbes, and a sense of light and depth that turned a piece of biology into a piece of cinema.
The craft
he film was shot live-action in Cape Town, with the spaniel performing on location against plates that would later be replaced or extended in post. SuperBlimp handled the full post pipeline: building the CG microbiome environments from the ground up, designing and animating the floating bacteria and microbe creatures, lighting each shot to match the live-action plates, integrating everything in compositing, and grading the final film. The opening sequence uses a cutaway anatomical reveal to transition the audience from the spaniel’s everyday life into the microbiome world, blending photoreal CG anatomy with the live-action plate as the visual bridge between the real-world story and the imagined inner one. Each microbe and bacterial form was developed as a small character in its own right, contributing to the overall feel of the world without distracting from the spaniel as the emotional anchor.
A walk through the film: from the real-world opening with the spaniel and its owner, through the transition into the microbiome environment, to the final return at the vet’s office. The full piece blends live-action plates with integrated CG anatomy, environment, and creature work across every shot.
Breakdown video
Brand Variants
Alongside the hero film, SuperBlimp produced a series of high-resolution stills for print and out-of-home placements, with the microbiome forest retuned across five distinct colour treatments for use across the Protexin range. Same environment, same lighting setup, same creature design, recoloured and re-graded for each variant. The full delivery also included custom frames and graphics, and a localisation-ready project package designed for rollout across multiple markets.
Credits
Credits
Client: Protexin · Agency: MBC
SuperBlimp’s role: Post production. CG environment design, creature design, animation, lighting, VFX integration, compositing, and colour.
Live Action Production Company: Gavin Schneider Productions · Director: Roshan Kapoor · DOP: Felipe Riel · Photography: Adrian Wroth · Producers: Gemma Ebethite, Laura Booth
Post Production (SuperBlimp) Post Supervisor: Antonio Milo · Post Production, VFX, and Colour: SuperBlimp
