Good Design: Storytelling in 3D
April 29th, 2009When we were approached by the Goldmund Media Group to bring the Goldmund Media Room to life online we were giddy with excitement! This assignment marked our opportunity to showcase Mavin Digital’s full-service capabilities in storytelling, design, 3D creation and animation.
Our Challenge
Create a visually immersive online experience that showcases the fine, elegant and premier audio, visual and home theater experience of Goldmund Media Room.
The Goal
Make home theater aficionados want to own the Goldmund Media Room.
The Result
An ownable 3D environment of the Goldmund Media Room that is making their customers go “oooh…wow that is something!” Wait to till you hear it!
To help us visualize what we are about to create I was invited to the Los Angeles office by the company’s President and his local team to experience the Goldmund Media Room for real. The showroom’s main exhibit is the Room with ten theater seats and a huge theater screen. The walls are red with intricate gold cornices and million dollar speakers hidden beneath the walls. A statement of elegance, rich and fabulous. I was not sure what to expect nor was I ready for the auditory immersion to the 130th decibel. Imagine that then you’ll believe it when I say “it was my best viewing of King Kong and Pearl Harbor ever – incredible and exquisite detail!”
Storytelling in 3D*
- Text storyboarding. What are the main points of the story that we would like the user to focus and learn about Goldmund Media Room? It took an afternoon of brainstorming by the pool with the client’s team. Note to self: brainstorm in luxury and indulge when you are thinking about a luxury brand. At the end of that session, we came up with four main story points: best seats in the house, Proteus modeling, our single source approach and Swiss made.
- Visual storyboarding. Now that we have an outline how do we tell the story visually? Once the outline is agreed upon by the client stakeholders, including their PR company we had to carefully illustrate each animation sequence with careful consideration to availability of assets and angles. Of course, assets were not available so we had to work directly from blueprints and engineering notes of the actual Room.
- 3D modeling. Is this the real thing? The Goldmund Media Room in 3D is an exact replica of the showroom in Los Angeles, CA. Long hours are allocated for each stage in the 3D modeling, layering and coloring to capture the finite details of the Room, the audio equipment and peripherals.
- Test animations. How many? Too many but it was well worth the effort. Once the rough 3D cuts of each sequence were complete we integrated the animations and experiment with lighting until the appropriate effects are reached.
- Final rendering. This is the final stage in the 3D process – no returns and exchanges unless you want to trash the months of previous work or pay change fees.
A video of all four 3D animation sequences will be on You Tube in a few weeks. When your story is ownable – that is good design.
Tags: 3D, animation, flash, Goldmund Media, Goldmund Media Room, Mavin Digital, Swiss
