Dell PowerEdge
The launch teaser for Dell's new PowerEdge servers, frozen technology shattering and reforming into the hardware, and the visual system behind the 20-spot campaign that followed it.
Dell was releasing its new PowerEdge line and needed a launch teaser. I pitched it abstract, frozen technology that explodes and then thaws back together, forming the new hardware inside the servers, and the concept sold internally before a frame was rendered. Enterprise gear, made to feel like an event.
The teaser opened a 20-spot campaign across the full server lineup, and the visual system I designed for it held every one of those films to a single launch language. That is the part of the job I care about most: not one beautiful film, but rules strong enough that twenty films feel like one idea.
Art direction, end to end
From a teaser brief to a 20-spot program
The brief said teaser. The direction work turned it into an idea, the new PowerEdge line frozen mid-explosion, thawing into the hardware, and then into a visual system sturdy enough to carry twenty films.
Research & direction
Make enterprise hardware an event
Server launches default to spinning racks and blue particles. The concept pitch was frozen technology: the internals suspended in ice, fractured, then thawing and reassembling into the new line. Cold light, glassy shards, one warm cue when the hardware wakes. Abstract enough to intrigue engineers, concrete enough to end on the product.
Storyboards
The stunt on paper
Boards sold the concept internally before a frame was built: ice field, fracture race, the shatter held in time, the reverse pull, the thaw waking the LEDs in sequence.
Animatic
Proving the hold
The whole film hinges on how long the shattered moment holds before reversing. The animatic tested that beat against the temp mix until the hold felt like held breath instead of dead air.
Animatic cut in Coveboard ↗, the AI-integrated pre-production and editing platform I designed and built.
Production
Viewport to final
Cinema 4D for the build and choreography, with the fracture and frost work carrying most of the render weight. The working scenes against the finished frames show the distance the light does the traveling.
Delivery
The teaser
Delivered as the launch teaser for the new PowerEdge line, the opening move of the campaign that followed. The full film is below.
Scale
One system, twenty spots
The teaser opened a 20-spot campaign introducing every server in the new lineup to engineers and technical decision-makers. I art directed and animated across the program, which meant designing the visual rules before a single spot was finished: how servers are revealed, how internals are exposed, how data and performance are visualized, the camera vocabulary, the light. Each film stands alone and unmistakably belongs to the same launch. For an audience that notices the details, consistency is credibility.
3D
Ice, fracture, and formation in CG: a way to make enterprise hardware feel like an event.
The work
PowerEdge, the teaser
The film that opened the launch: frozen technology that explodes, then thaws and reassembles into the new hardware inside the servers.
Key art · concept
The still-frame home
A key-art and social study pulling the frozen moment into print and feed formats, so the launch language has a still-frame home between spots. A technical audience still wants to feel something.
Key visual + social
