Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria

Screenshot from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing a person with their brain and digestive system connected by the vagus nerve. Glowing dots in the digestive organs represent the gut microbiome, and a magnified view of several bacteria speci
Storyboard panel from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing a person with their brain and digestive system connected by the vagus nerve. A magnified view of several bacteria species is shown in a callout.
Storyboard panel from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing the small intestine with blood vessels, lymph nodes, and nerves underlying the gut epithelium.
Storyboard panel from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing a more close-up shot of the small intestine villi. The gut microbiome is represented by colourful glowing dots.
Storyboard panel from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing a very close-up view of the tip of a villus. At this scale, the microvilli and individual bacteria of the gut microbiome are visible.
Storyboard panel from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing immune cells just underneath the gut epithelium of a microvillus.
Screenshot from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing the inside of the small intestine. Microvilli line the walls, all covered by a layer of mucus.
Screenshot from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing a closer view of the microvilli. A fine mist of bacteria are visible on the surface of the mucus.
Screenshot from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing a closer view of the tip of a villus, with bacteria sitting on top of the mucus lining.
Screenshot from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing an extreme close-up of the tip of a villus. At this scale, the microvilli and individual bacteria of the gut microbiome are visible.
Screenshot from Micronauts: The Beauty of Bacteria, showing a cross-section of the tip of a villus. A dendritic cell reaches between the epithelial cells to sense bacterial molecules in the mucus lining the villus.
 

Client: Winclove Probiotics
Agency: Digizyme, Inc.
Contribution: Worked with team members and led ideation, storyboarding, and animation for several scenes
Year: 2023
Media: Autodesk Maya, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe After Effects

This documentary, directed by Hans Busstra, is about bacteria, the bacterial microbiomes that live on and inside our bodies, and how they play a crucial role in our daily lives. Shown above is a screenshot of a scene I contributed to, as well as storyboard panels for scenes I contributed to (final scenes, shown in the following screenshots, were produced by other team members).

View the full documentary on Youtube.
See full credits at Micronauts.