Illustrator Paul Hwang, creator of Nanospore, recently teamed up with animators Chris Riehl and Sean Starkweather to create an amazing animated video for Nike Japan. The piece is part of a viral marketing campaign promoting the Nike Free Trainer 7.0.

Commissioned as a short film, the video depicts the selling points for Nike’s new “Meta7″ shoe. The story was both illustrated and written by Huang. The characters, Anieruz (circle), Seveno (square), and Manipith (triangle), disappear from their oppressed lives and return transformed with new powers. Accompanied by a print and sculpture campaign, the pieces toured Asia debuting at Tokyo Designer’s week.

What is particularly strong about this piece is the combination of illustration and camera movement. We really feel like we are inside the animation. 3d animation made to look like it’s drawn (sometimes called cel-shaded), makes it seem that drawings have come to life. Adding dynamic camera movement and shake takes it to another level.

The project was art directed by Eric Cruz (Wieden+Kennedy Tokyo). The wonderful music and sound was done by Sun An (Hellobye). Additional support by Joel Chang, Chad Howitt, Jason Kim, Evan Parsons, Elena Page, Theo Alexopoulos, and David Yan.