A new innovation that creates 'photos' of fabrics
This article is about technique and not about creativity. However, the process of getting here was very creative. I'm part of new company called Fashion Textile Rendering Institute that is specialized in creating rendered imagery.
For who is our product interesting?
Our solution could be very interesting for Fokke de Jong of Suitsupply. Why? Our solution is very green and it's a big innovation. Suitsupply already has something similar to what we deliver but, I have to say, our quality is better, much better (that's the photographic 3D rendering) than what Suitsupply currently uses on their website. Honestly so far I haven't seen better quality than what we create.
Of course our invention is not only interesting for Suitsupply. It is interesting for middle or large size companies that sell (or create) clothing, especially those that use one model and use hundreds different kinds of fabrics. Furniture is also an option. So, our product is interesting for companies that sell an item, like a suit (or furniture, or other clothing etc) and have a wide choice of fabrics. For example one suit in one hundred different fabrics, one sofa in one hundred different fabrics.
What is it exactly?
It’s rendering. This is very simple but sometimes difficult to explain. We create 'photos' of clothing or furniture, we create imagery by using several rendering techniques. Our output are files that look like 'photos' or 'films' but they aren't. You don't see the difference, you think you see a photo but actually it is a 3d rendered image. To read more go to the website of the Fashion Textile Rendering Institute.
Here you see an example, you see ‘photos’ of suits and folded shirts. But these suits and shirts never existed in the real world. This is just imagery.
What was my contribution so far?
For over 10 years I've been taking photos of clothing (lots and lots of suits). I have vast knowledge of the interaction of light with fabrics and of digitally altering it. You might think it is just as easy to render a photo of an iPhone as of a suit. Actually it is much more easy to render an iPhone than a piece of clothing made from fabrics. It is really another world of rendering.
My over 10 year experience of photography of fabrics was key knowledge which I needed to help creating photographic 3d rendering.
And a final note: currently we are looking for new partners in 3D rendering, specialised in the fashion industry. We want to expand and deliver a diversity of 3d rendered imagery. Our difference is quality, it needs to look like the real thing and not like a computer creation.