Little Things with Big Impact

'The Little Things' for Dell shows how our relationship with technology can unlock the emotional highs of personal achievement.

We kicked off our partnership with directing tandem Mindcastle with a fun one -- Dell and agency VML wanted to explore how the smallest details can add up to the biggest impacts, through a story of tech, sport, and human ingenuity. The film, a scripted journey following a coach and player preparing for a high-stakes rematch, required bespoke VFX to illustrate the coach's imaginary tech insight. We asked Mindcastle how they approach putting nebulous concepts to screen.

"We always start with the story first. What is the heart of our character’s motivations? And then we create rules or guidelines around the VFX elements that will help them weave seamlessly into the narrative. Whether that is screen replacement, a more complex or fantastical VFX element, it should feel like it belongs within the world of the film," Casey and Danielle of Mindcastle say.

The visual language combines elements of motion and momentum—both literal and metaphorical—underscoring the idea that work is fluid, driven by creativity, and enabled by the right tools. VFX was kept minimal and purposeful, used primarily to enhance the realism of the human experience. Mindcastle developed VFX mock ups early on in the creative process to help inform the narrative so that the data on-screen was not just a visual element, but a core component of the story. 

The production itself involved complex location coordination in Chile, live-action and product integration, and a collaborative post process to weave together multiple storylines and elements with an emotionally cohesive arc.

"On many projects, the content on computer screens is decided after filming happens. In this case, the content on the screens was what propelled the story forward and gave our character motivation. They couldn’t just look stylistically well-designed, they also had to give important context. We knew each screen needed a story driven purpose that fit the opening, middle, and final beats of the film. 

In our hero’s first scene she analyzes footage and that gives her the spark of inspiration to go through the rest of the film, resulting in the win for her team. We needed that first screen to clearly show that she was a data analyst coach, watching past games. Then after that, every screen is more data focused that could help them shape the training the players are doing. 

For the second act where the training takes place we designed a simple soccer goal with dots animating over it representing shots on goal. This then informed the middle beats of the film, where our hero player is practicing shots on goal throughout the second act."

"We find it's often really important to have some comps and VFX designs in our treatment so the client and agency can envision our goals for the film. For Dell, we designed screens for every computer in our treatment and then also created a design guide. Everyone from agency to client really loved the thought process behind our initial ideas for the screens, so we were able to use those as a starting point for performance and story beats."

The spot has been rolled out across web, social and national broadcast during the 2025 NBA playoffs.