Long Eaton Guild Donate to Hospice in Memory of Matt O'Flynn
At Orbital, we have had a close relationship with the Long Eaton Guild since the beginning. Not only being based in the heart of the UK Centre of Upholstery, and recently redesigning Iain James’ website (who is a core member of the Guild), but we have a little more history than that.
Our agency used to be a widely varied digital design agency, and it was in summer 2017 that we realigned our business to focus on the interiors industry. This was in no small part, down to a strong friendship turned business venture when Matt joined Rob Walker at Orbital. After many years of close friendship and business partnerships, decided to team up to create the vision that we have in the Studio today. From launching a new hub of the industry, to being at the forefront of the field after developing brand new technology to digitally recreate fabric. They built a studio, and a team from the ground up, and a bloody good one at that.
Matt sat as the chairman of the Long Eaton Guild from 2007 to 2018, being completely immersed in the furniture industry from a young age. A pioneer in the industry, there aren’t many people in the industry that haven’t heard of Matt O’Flynn. He was the man of many hats (both figuratively and literally) Sadly, Matt was diagnosed with Cancer just as Orbital moved into the new studio.
Earlier this year, Matt lost his battle with cancer after a stay in St Michael’s Hospice in East Sussex. The Hospice gave incredible care, and always made sure there was an atmosphere of laughter and warmth, making not only Matt’s time more comfortable, but that of his family too.
When the Guild approached Orbital in order to create a new website to house both details of the Guild, and the famed bi-annual Longpoint, there was only one condition. We would happily create a new, user-friendly website, as long as it was created in dedication to Matt, and that the price of the project was waived, and donated to St Michael’s Hospice instead. Andrew Mitchell and Iain James of the Guild couldn’t think of anything better, and so the project began.The Long Eaton Guild now have a new site to encourage visitors to Long Point, and in turn have generously donated a sum of £500 to a hospice that is doing so much for so many.
The hospice has responded to the donation with huge amounts of gratitude to both the Guild and Orbital, highlighting how many more people they can now help with these funds.
“Thank you so much for your overwhelmingly generous donation given in memory of Mr Matt O’Flynn. What an incredible gift which will enable the hospice to continue to support many more people. As you know, our services are provided free, and we are reliant on the kindness of people like you who give so generously in order for others to benefit from the support we offer. On behalf of the team at St Michael’s Hospice, thank you. Your generosity is heart-warming.”
See the brand new Long Eaton Guild Website here: http://www.longeatonguild.co.uk/
Donate to St Michael’s Hospice here: http://stmichaelshospice.com/
Designing in a Virtual World
Forget starting your new design with a pen and paper, new virtual reality (VR) technology boasts the ability to see and walk around a 3D sketch of your new product at the very first stages of the design process.
Using new headset technologies, it is now possible to conjure 3D shapes out of thin air, using a ‘virtual pen’, and share the life-like design with clients and colleagues around the world, in real time.
While a similar process is already available, where companies are cutting time and money by sending prototype sketches to 3D agencies (like us) to create and edit their new products without building a single piece, the whole process is looking to become more accessible over the next few years. For those who have the budget, that is. VR is finally beginning to fulfil its potential for business.
"You can walk around your sketches so you can see how your lines work in a 3D environment, and move freely in a room, explains Jan Pflueger , augmented and virtual reality co-ordinator for German car firm Audi.
In the past, the technology - hardware, software, connectivity - simply wasn't up to the job.
"Designers didn't like using headsets because the image resolution was too low," says Mr Pflueger.
As well as low resolution images, the headsets were bulky and full of wires making them uncomfortable and impractical. But now, with advancing technologies and internet speeds VR is becoming more like reality every day.
Looking at the big players ahead of the game, Audi is working with Finnish start-up Varjo, “which has recently starting selling a high-end (€5,995; £5,170) headset boasting ‘human eye resolution’ using a technique called ‘foveated rendering’. It uses eye-tracking technology to tell which part of the image you're focusing on, then concentrates its processing power on that section to render it in high definition.”
With the images being high resolution, it means that designers can see necessary modifications and make changes before any expensive physical prototypes have been made speeding up the design process at a very early stage. Not only can you share the designs with colleagues, but also clients. The efficiency of the process is heightened by adding input from the end-user at the very beginning. Pretty cool if you ask us.
The possibilities this opens is endless, with customers being able to walk round a show home or car showroom, and tailored designs available to edit in real-time, taking away lengthy waiting times on decision making and removing the hesitation from the buying process. Giving the interchangeable choice of colour schemes, flooring and carpet choices, kitchen options and on. But such high-quality graphics require a lot of processing power, so most high-end headsets have to be "tethered" to a powerful computer. But not for long.
A big breakthrough will be to offer near human-eye resolution VR without the need for any cables. And this is where high-speed 5G connections will have a big impact. With streaming speeds 10 to 20 times faster than existing connections, the high-res images will be sent to the headsets wirelessly.
Looking into our Orbital crystal ball, we can see that design processes will be completely transformed over the next five to ten years as VR technology becomes more accessible. But if you’re not quite ready to take into account this type of spending, take the first step and see how we can revolutionise your marketing materials, with the use of 3D.
Digitising Your Fabrics: Our Process
We understand that not everyone has been immersed in the world of 3D. You may have been told that you will need 3D assets of your fabrics, but you are not sure how the process works and it is stopping you from taking that first step. So, we thought we’d give some clarity:
1. The Pitch
We want to show off what we can do, and we want to make sure that will help the development of your business. So, the first step is inviting you to come to our office to have a peek of the projects we are currently working on, and we will probably show off some technical wizardry – the team is pretty talented, we can’t help showing them off. We will then sit you down and talk about where the gaps in your visual marketing and online sales are, and the best way to solve them. Don’t expect any visual concepts yet, but we can show you some of our case studies that may sway you. (We also serve a great lunch which is worth the visit alone.)
Then there is increased SEO. Search engines favour relevant content. And images getting clicks are exactly that type of materials: they bring visitors to the website, lead them to explore its content and interact with it. So, the more successful images you have, the more chance you have of getting and keeping top positions in the search results.
Needless to say, each product shot needs alt and title tags, and descriptions. So when your high-quality, engaging product design renderings have well-written attributes with relevant keywords, search engine rankings will know that your page content is high-quality and therefore useful for your target audience.
2. The Brief
Once we’ve got the job (thanks!), we will ask for a swatch or flat photograph of each fabric that you need digitalised so that we can work our magic. If you were really great clients you would also send us a lifestyle shot of the fabric, wrapping a product, so we can see the way light hits it at different angles.
3. The Build
Our team will then recreate your fabrics with flawless step and repeat patterns, photo-realistic textures and colour matching perfection. You don’t need to know too much about this part, except that we can recreate your fabrics in record time. Seriously, we can have a fabric swatch perfectly digitised in under ten minutes. You really won’t believe it.
4. The Finished Product
You have proofed and fallen in love with all the images. So now it is up to you where you are going to use them. We can put them in a great brochure design. Use them to drastically improve your eCommerce website or ask us to build room sets for them to be placed into for a time and cost effective alternative to photoshoots .
It really is as simple as that. We always make sure you’re involved in the whole process and our door is always open. Why not check out some of our previous work here . Come and meet us (or Skype if you’re too far away), send us your fabrics and that’s it! You’ll have your perfect 3D assets in no time at all. What are you waiting for?
How One 3D Render Can Transform Your Marketing Process
Furniture CGI has revolutionised product marketing and advertising. Previously, getting marketing imagery required a longwinded and costly photoshoot. Naturally, each change in season or new addition to a range required a new photoshoot, so the process started all over again.
With the advent of photorealistic 3D product rendering, Marketers and Manufacturers get perfect imagery in a simple and cost-effective way. Furniture CGI of any type – lifestyle, product shots, animation – can be created digitally, with no limits to creativity. And it can all be created from one simple sketch. Let us tell you how.
1. 3D visualisation for websites
Once your first 3D model is built, you can get a whole variety of furniture CGI: close-ups for demonstration of textures, materials and tiny details; cutouts for highlighting the inner structure of products, front views for general outside looks, side and bird views for showing the design from every angle.
Most importantly, the process is simple if you hire the right team. All a Manufacturer needs is to provide the 3D Artists with a reference image of the furniture product and its dimensions. No photoshoots, heavy prototypes transportation, and no need to control the process: 3D rendering companies create everything digitally, and in photoreal quality.
2. A CGI model allows for any colour-way to be showcased
A 3D visualisation can be edited. This way, 3D Artist can change fabric colours and textures for the Marketer to showcase all colourways and finishing options. Which is way more cost-effective than producing a separate prototype for each colour and send them all to a photography studio. Moreover, photorealistic CGI colourways will look every bit as impressive as a photo.
3. 3D model is perfect for showing different configurations
A professional 3D rendering team can make changes to the image geometry and get new furniture design configurations, for instance, add new armrests to a chair. Which is a great way to show all design variations in a furniture catalogue, as well as getting the cgi for a new upgraded version of the same design.
Making changes to a furniture configuration is also handy when it comes to testing the market. Before even having the physical prototype for models with upgraded design, companies can upload images to their website and start selling by pre-orders.
4. 3D Model of a furniture item can be put in a variety of scenes
With one 3D model, 3D Artists can place a product in a multitude of scenes, whether one needs a plain background or roomsets in different environments. Various lifestyle cgi is a great idea for furniture advertising, because different interior scenes showcase different benefits of a design and therefore appeal to different audiences.
Just imagine: one 3D model, and a plethora of lifestyle images without buying decor or going to locations, as it is the case with photography studios. Professional 3D Artists will create any kind of tailor-made interior scenes digitally, specifically for the product.
5. A 3D model can be further reused for any type of furniture CGI
Another advantage of 3D modelling for product design is that it can be used to get any type of 3D renderings, be it still furniture images or interactive solutions. With a ready 3D model, a Marketer or Manufacturer can get new visual materials in less time and at a reduced cost across all types of media. Online marketing campaigns benefit from photorealistic 3D animations, 360˚ views, even brochures and Virtual and Augmented Reality. The possibilities really are endless.
Furniture cgi has changed the product promotion process forever. Now, photorealistic 3D renders are an asset allowing to get top-notch images for online and traditional marketing, and refresh them any time. 3D modelling and visualization allow companies to get visuals faster than with photography, and it costs less. To get started on your 3D journey, contact Orbital today.
5 Tips for Successful Digital Marketing Using 3D Rendering
Product 3D rendering is the best way to get unlimited numbers of marketing imagery fast. Not just images looking good on the website, but images that make visitors click the call-to-action – have a look at the website, learn more about the item and finally make a purchase.
So, Manufacturers and Marketers use 3D product rendering services to get creative marketing images. Group and hero shots, plain backgrounds and lifestyles, detail, general, front and top view, with cutouts, customization features, colour solutions – 3D rendering software can create it all, you name it. Let’s look at 5 ways product 3D rendering makes digital campaigns breed results.
1. 3D Visualisation for Websites
When shopping online, customers expect to see at least 3 images of a product. Naturally, the more images, the better chances to get full attention of the audience. Product 3D rendering eases most customer concerns. 3D lifestyles show the types of environment the item looks best in, as well as dimensions and the decor that goes with it, whilst isolated shots highlight the main features of a product and show its design without distractions.
And let’s not forget about animation. 3D animations, panoramas, 360 views provide more information on the item and make for a pleasant customer experience. The viewer appreciates being able to turn the object around, zoom in, see the detail. Not only does it make shopping more pleasant, but in 2019, these luxuries have come to be expected, and the fickly customer is likely to leave your site in favour of another online shop which allows them to see all angles in a greater quality render.
Then there is increased SEO. Search engines favour relevant content. And images getting clicks are exactly that type of materials: they bring visitors to the website, lead them to explore its content and interact with it. So, the more successful images you have, the more chance you have of getting and keeping top positions in the search results.
Needless to say, each product shot needs alt and title tags, and descriptions. So when your high-quality, engaging product design renderings have well-written attributes with relevant keywords, search engine rankings will know that your page content is high-quality and therefore useful for your target audience.
2. Photo Realistic Rendering for Content Marketing
Blog is a must-have for successful product marketing. Sure enough, one can cope without it, but why missing on a sure way to increase brand visibility, drive more traffic to the website and build mailing lists. Product 3D rendering provides Marketers and Manufacturers with imagery to illustrate the articles. So that the blog visitors not only read about how to get a high-quality armchair, but actually see what should be inside owing to 3D cut-outs.
Not to mention the ease of seasonal marketing. With 3D rendering you can ever-change the colours, background and interior accessories that surround your product. Making it marketing ready for any season in an instant.
3. Product Visualisation for Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing is a powerful tool that can skyrocket profit. It’s the best way to reach out to practically any target audience, in the age of the internet. Successful social media campaigns allow to build hypes for product launches, increase brand awareness, and drive more traffic to the website. And product 3D rendering allows to get any kind of images for promotional campaigns, whatever the strategy and creative idea.
On Facebook, it always makes sense to tap into the power of 360 views and videos for customers to learn more about the product line and the brand itself. 3D visualizations in Pinterest and Twitter will make sure consumers find and pin or retweet your images when looking for inspiration.
4. CGI for Digital Advertising
Much of the power of digital advertising lies in the fact that that Marketers can measure results and kill the ad if it’s no good, or make changes. Unlike photography, product 3D rendering cost and technology allow for the images to be tested and altered without photoshoots and transportation fees. This way, your marketing team can test the image until they find which drives the most engagement. Which is great news for online advertising budgets.
5. Product 3D Rendering for Email Marketing
Email marketing campaign is a time-proven way to drive interested consumers to the website and even reactivate dormant customers. Combined with social media advertising, it has twice as much power. Having a variety of 3D visualizations is incredibly handy for implementing strategy. Promoting new models, announcing events and sales – high-impact imagery is always handy to build communication with clients.
Digital Marketing Campaigns are now vital for the success of any company. If you feel like you are not making the most of your strategy, and need some advice or want us to send you an example of the flexibility of our renders on one of your products, get in touch with us at Orbital today.
Agency vs In House: Who Should You Hire for Digital Marketing
Should you hire in-house or hire an agency? When it comes to digital marketing, the decision can be critical.
It is a huge decision which must align with budgets, timelines, and long-term business strategy. Let’s not beat around the bush, we are an agency, so of course we will be slightly biased. But there is a reason that there are a huge number of successful agencies in existence, because they are a sensible business addition. Let’s take a closer look at some of the reasons why.
Skill Diversification
In general, digital marketers tend to have very specific skill sets. You have paid search specialists, social media masters, web content / developers, graphic designers, conversion rate rulers…and the list goes on.
But the thing is, digital marketing is too complex for one person to be an expert at everything. So, if you hire a paid search specialist in-house, you can expect them to do a great job at paid search. But what if paid search isn’t panning out? Or what if the competition is driving great results with an ever-evolving website?
What do you do then? Obviously, you could just hire a web developer and content marketer, but that may not necessarily be in the budget or you may not be completely sold on the idea yet. What should you do?
Diversifying Your Marketing
Companies that hire in-house often struggle to diversify their digital marketing efforts and completely align their branding with online materials and print materials for a cohesive and effective strategy. After all, investing in a new marketing channel is a risk. If you hire someone and it doesn’t work out, you’ve just created a very difficult situation for yourself.
As a result, these companies often end up stuck in one marketing channel. And, often, that channel isn’t even working that well. For example, if you’ve got a great landing page designer but terrible ads that are driving the wrong traffic to your site, you may have trouble getting good results from your campaigns.
Is that your designer’s fault? Of course not! But, if you’re restricting your marketing resources like this, you probably won’t end up getting the results from digital marketing that you’re hoping for.On the other hand, with a good agency, you have access to a wide range of skills and experience.
For example, at Orbital, we have a team that put their skills together to create successful websites and campaigns. Individually, each team member is good at what they do, but collectively, they provide much more value than any single person could. And, as an added bonus, since each team member is actively working with a number of accounts, they have a depth and breadth of experience that gives them insights they can apply to new campaigns and situations. We have the added bonus of also offering services like enVision and print marketing and design which will align all aspects of your marketing under one roof. Tempting, right?
What's the damage?
As a result, our clients don’t end up with account managers who have tunnel vision or who lose creativity over time. Instead, our clients get 6 sets of eyes on their account on a regular basis.
So, when it comes to skill diversification, should you go with an agency or hire in-house?
Really, when you get right down to it, this is a question of resources. For larger companies, it may be worth the investment to hire someone in-house to diversify their marketing efforts, although, when it comes to hiring Orbital, you get the best of a digital marketing agency, with 3D render and other exciting futuristic benefits on top.
After all, if your marketing needs are significant enough that they justify hiring a dedicated expert, you may get the best results from hiring someone to work on a channel full-time. However, for most businesses, agencies are a great option for diversification. Most companies don’t need (or can’t yet afford) to hire a full team of dedicated marketers, so working with an agency can be a great way to widen your marketing net without significantly increasing your overhead.
Conclusion
There are a lot of reasons why people pick an agency or simply decide to keep things in-house. Both are completely viable ways to grow your business. However, agencies offer a lot in the way of skill diversification, breadth of experience and value for money, which is why many businesses find that going with an agency is the best way to grow their business.
If this article has made you wonder if you are really getting the best from your digital marketing, and you think Orbital may be able to help you grow, get in touch with us today for a discussion on where we could take you.
3 Reasons Why Product Photography is a Thing of The Past
Photoshoots may seem a necessary spend for furniture manufacturers and retailers, but they are quickly becoming a thing of the past. And here are three reasons why.
Faster turnaround on the creation of marketing materials
Costs involved in furniture photography skyrocket compared to 3D rendering
Ability to make design changes on the fly
3D rendering makes sense for companies of all sizes, and let me tell you why. While photorealistic 3D rendering may sound like something out of reach for small companies, it doesn’t have to be. Regardless of how many products you have – even if it’s just one – you could benefit from a 3D render. When your design is going through changes, having a 3D render will allow you to easily manipulate the design, making changes on-the-go. This is important because it’ll allow buyers and designers to visualise the end-product. You can enjoy quick turnarounds for your marketing campaigns, without the extra time having to be put aside, once your prototype is made in 3D, your product launch can begin straight away, for sales to come rolling in.
If you need a helping hand or some advice when it comes to making the transition to 3D rendering, get in touch with us today. We are the experts.
Why Virtual Reality Will Soon Be the Only Way to Buy Furniture
Thanks to new technologies like augmented reality, 3D rendering and virtual reality, the furniture industry is finally ready to have its online moment. These are the latest tools designers and retailers are using to give clients a clearer vision of projects and purchases before they commit.
As we see the retail industry move away from brick and mortar we are seeing online only retailers start growing, in some areas overtaking high street shops. This is particularly surprising in the furniture and homewares sector, but we saw it in 2018 as online mattress companies like “Caspar” and “Emma” were topping mattress sales without a single brick and mortar shop. This really opens up a space for virtual reality as we see a gap in the market for endless opportunities to show products to the consumer without having to see a product in real life.
Books and music were the first products to really see success online. Without having to touch or feel the products, there was little standing in the way of a consumer clicking on the Buy Now button. Once user reviews were introduced into the mix, the ecommerce virus started taking hold of electronics too. When it came to clothing, it took a little more brain power. With consumers being used to trying on clothes and feeling the quality of fabrics, online apparel had a slow start. But it was nothing that next day delivery and free returns couldn’t fix.
Now, it’s furniture’s time to shine online, but the category requires completely new tactics. While user reviews help customers understand the quality and feel of products, they can’t help a buyer see how the piece actually fits in a room, which is the biggest obstacle we’re seeing when consumers consider the risks of buying online.
Furniture buying requires consumers to invest significant amounts of time and money choosing an item they will have to live with for many years. Add this to the thought that homeowners will want to see if a furniture piece fits in their space, and matches the current arrangements and products they already have in their home, virtual reality can really kick in.
We are seeing AR and VR crop up in certain home décor apps, even if it is still early and some are stilted. Take Dulux for example, although not perfect, their app allows you to take a photo of your room and place their paint colours on any wall, so you can preview the finished look without spending any time or money. Now imagine the success if this was available to interior designers and general homeowners in the realm of furniture. Superimposing that sofa you’ve been lusting after, into your current living room space – to scale – and in your chosen fabric. It’s important to envision the whole room, including pieces you own and pieces you’re considering purchasing. We don’t think that this new retail revolution is far off. But you know what they say – the early bird catches the worm. It is usually the businesses who nail these new approaches first that get the long-term results.
The future can be exciting, if maybe a little daunting. Orbital are working on their own Virtual Reality products to help retailers and manufacturers sell their products – keep your eyes peeled for updates!
Thank You from Orbital
After an incredible year of growth for Orbital in 2018, we kicked off 2019 in style with an incredibly successful January Furniture Show.
On 20thJanuary this year, we were all set up to see how a creative agency would fare in the UK’s biggest furniture show. With over 500 exhibitors and a record number of attendees, there was a real sense of optimism in the air. In a climate where there is a lot of uncertainty surrounding business decisions, the success of the January Furniture Show was a welcome triumph. And we at Orbital were no different.
With our whole team upheaved to Birmingham, it was business as usual. What better way to show you what we do, than show you what we do! Our team was busy building furniture in 3d and wrapping them in various fabrics whilst simultaneously creating room-sets to showcase the furniture. They were also demonstrating our product builder which allows users to select a piece of furniture and custom wrap the product, cushions, piping and more, in any number of fabrics and textures.
Amongst the thousands of attendees over the four days that followed, we had a huge number of visitors to our stand. Whether we can blame that on the fun we were having with our virtual reality headset, the constant supply of Haribo and coffee, or our designs, we will never know. Either way, we do know it was watching the team at work that secured an impressive number of new and potential clients and would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who came to say hello. We are lucky enough to now be working on projects for the likes of Graham and Green, Sofa Sofa, Warwick Fabrics and so many more.
As well as those of you that we got to meet, and the interest you took in what we can do to grow businesses in the furniture industry, we also got to hear who the long-awaited winners of the Furniture News awards. The lucky five that were awarded for stand out products are in for a free room set build from us. As promised, after the winners were announced on the first day of the show, we started capturing images of the winners’ products before starting the 3D build on our enVision platform to create an invaluable marketing tool for the winning companies.
Make sure you keep an eye out for our progress updates and the finished products for the winners Parker Knoll, Sealy UK, Wiemann, Hartman UK and ALF. Maybe we’ll even have a game of spot the difference between the photographs and our renders, just to show what we really mean when we say you can’t tell the difference.
Have a sneaky peak at what we could do to grow your business here
Danish Delights at London Design Fair
Danish Delights - London Design Fair 2018
It was great to see the pavilion stand representing a variety of Danish brands at Design Week.
Showcasing products from Georg Jensen, Republic of Fritz Hansen, Warm Nordic, Junckers, Tom Rossae, Berhart and BoConcept, there was plenty for the eye to admire.
We loved the simple shaping, unfussy detail, the curved Danish form of low slung upholstery and the modern take of a dining chair that looked inspired, by the Hans J Wegner classic Wishbone.
Paper type hanging lanterns, that are reminiscent of paper planes crafted as a kid and authentic wood cubes (multi use, side tables or a footstool), with the detail of the grain. The white origami inspired hanging lanterns, which suggested movement were graceful and elegant, making a great focal statement piece for a room.
Lovely to see the classic Danish ‘butterfly’ type dining chair, upholstered for a change! In a gorgeous deep claret.
