FutureDeluxe explains the brand film they created for Markforged’s state-of-the-art 3D printer.

A leading pioneer of industrial 3D printing, Markforged values elegant innovation and the company found a like-minded creative partner in FutureDeluxe. A global creative studio awarded for visual excellence and innovation, FutureDeluxe’s offices in London, New York City, Los Angeles, and Sydney share a commitment to striking art direction and future-facing design for brands.

Markforged FX10 from FutureDeluxe on Vimeo.

With a brief to communicate the key features of the Markforged FX10 3D printer, Creative Director Raj Davsi assembled a team of artists and designers in the New York studio to craft the cinematic launch film using Cinema 4D, Houdini, and Redshift.

British-born Davsi joined FutureDeluxe London in 2019 and moved to the New York office in 2022. Bringing a passion for photography and filmmaking to his role as creative director, he saw the vast options for telling a compelling story about a state-of-the-art industrial 3D printer designed for use on the factory floor.

With trust and a collaborative relationship in place, a loose brief to showcase the quality and performance of the product played to the studio’s strengths and Davsi was left to come up with the story and develop the concept.

“We developed a concept around 3D-printed grippers so we could show how they are made before being mounted on an industrial robotic arm, ready for action,” he explains. The fabrication process inspired an abstract visual narrative in which machine components assemble to print and fit the grippers. “We wanted every element and texture look beautiful and true to the product. Our starting point was to dive into R&D, collecting references from the client that we set out to match as closely as possible within each product theme.”

Getting the details right

With concepts for illustrating product quality, precision and reliability, as well as a powerful software interface and industrial-strength output, the FutureDeluxe team created product, simulations, animation tests, and style frames to get the textures and art direction right for each aspect of the film.

Cinema 4D was used to achieve critical detail, Davsi recalls. “We remodeled some of the supplied CAD assets to get the right level of detail for close-ups. For example, to showcase the 3D printer head’s mechanism, we rigged the belt and created an accurate feel of how the mechanism tracks.” They also used C4D to create hand-driven animations demonstrating product assembly and operation and to texture and light environmental elements, robotic arms.

To accurately showcase the additive printing process, one of Davsi’s colleagues, a 3D printing enthusiast, suggested extracting product-specific G-code data from a 3D printer. “Importing that into

Houdini allowed us to create this true-to-life layering effect for the animation test, which was then used in production to demonstrate the 3D printing process,” he explains.

Reflecting on the success of that approach, Davsi recalls that there were some practical challenges to overcome, like ensuring that the edge of the 3D-printed gripper was perfectly solid through the ascending layers, which was very difficult to recreate. “We solved it by using a textural approach, and it was down to Redshift’s flexibility that we were able to isolate parts of the 3D model to showcase this inner layer,” he says, adding that Redshift was central to the project’s entire workflow.

In fact, Redshift’s seamless integration with the studio’s primary tools was invaluable to ensure a consistent feel across the whole project. “The 3D printing sequence was rendered in Houdini and Redshift, and the rest in Cinema 4D and Redshift. For me, it’s like shooting on two different cameras but essentially coming up with the same look.”

Circling back to his passion for photography and filmmaking, Davsi and his team are proud of the way the project turned out and the client was happy too. “When they first saw one of our test shots, I remember them saying, ‘My god, is that really a render?’ and that was great.”

With Markforged wrapped up, Davsi is moving forward with new client briefs and an ongoing personal project that explores how AI, fashion and design can come together to create something unique. Reflecting on his first year in the Brooklyn-based studio, he feels he’s in the right place to be part of a culture that embraces creative and technical vision and fearless experimentation.

Credits:
Designed, Directed & Produced by FutureDeluxe
Client: Markforged
Creative Director: Raj Davsi
Producer: Tiffany Brathwaite
Executive Producer: Ellis Garrod
Designers: Jake Wyand, Nick Bauer, Ollie Harris, Dagmar Irrig, Steve Barwise
Modeler: Kornel Makarowicz
Rigger: Sam Cividanis
Sound: Echoic
Color: No8, Tim Smith