Honey Nut Cheerios commercial

This is a Spaceship and Launch Pad that I built last November for a Honey Nut Cheerios commercial. I was contacted by Uli Meyer Animation who asked for a "near future" looking rocket for the advert, they liked the European Ariane 5 style of ship and gantry over the US/Nasa style of craft, so using pics found online I built a ship and added more of a shuttle type front as Ariane is only really a payload carrier and not a manned ship. I knew from the beginning that the shot would be locked off, so the gantry was pretty much just built to what the camera seen.
The ship however was built in full. The final shot required a large moon and steam to be added to the shot. I provided 4 seconds worth of animation which included flashing orange warning lights and spinning radar dish, and the team at Uli Meyer Animation provided the moon and steam elements to the final shot.

Here are some frames from the final advert, the spaceship shot opens the 30 commercial, and is only 27 frames in length, seems an awful lot of work for something that pops by so quickly but it does it's job of establishing the location of the piece. The animated Honey Nut Cheerios Bee was animated by the guys at Uli Meyer Studios. From what I gather the advert isn't getting shown here in the UK, but is showing in various European countries. When it appears on You Tube I'll post a link. Now this is only a fanciful TV commercial, so there's no logic why the ship would be sitting upright on the launch pad yet the astronaut is sitting at what appears to be just a control desk, and not in a reclining chair like a real rocket, he also appears to be the only member of the crew. :)

Here's a lighter picture of the final model.

And here are the different render elements that went to make up the final animation.