MerchandAise · 3D product configurator
The Configurator Hero Shot
One custom jersey as the live centrepiece of a product configurator, photoreal and front-and-centre, with the promise of 300+ customisable products sitting behind it as frosted-glass cubes.
How do you show a product configurator's full range in one frame?
A product configurator promises hundreds of customisable products. I wanted that promise visible in a single frame, no clutter, no text.
The hero jersey reads as the item being configured right now. The background communicates the scale of the catalog behind it. One shot that tells the whole configurator story.
I handled the creative direction end to end: simulation polish, scene building, shading, lighting, animation and rendering.
The shot the move builds toward
The custom jersey holds the centre, sharp and photoreal. Behind it, a deep field of frosted-glass cubes carries hundreds of products back into soft bokeh.
The background
Instead of a flat product wall, I built the background from frosted-glass cubes, each one holding a real product render. Three hundred previously finished renders of customisable products, suspended inside the glass.
The frosted surface softens and abstracts each product just enough to keep the hero jersey dominant, while still signalling depth, variety and a full catalog. Glass refraction and falloff carry the eye back into the frame and let everything dissolve into bokeh.
The jersey
The jersey started as a cloth simulation in Marvelous Designer. My job was polishing that sim, refining the drape, seams, collar and fabric tension so it reads as real teamwear, not a stiff or shrink-wrapped mesh.
Clean folds and a believable fit were the priority. The jersey is the focal point and holds up to the closest scrutiny in the frame.
Scene & light
The full scene was built in Cinema 4D: the hero placement, the depth-stacked cube field and the camera move that keeps focus locked on the configurable jersey.
Shading was done in Redshift, fabric materials with the right sheen and weave for the jersey, frosted-glass and refraction materials for the cubes. Lighting was set to make the hero pop against the softer background, with depth of field pulling the cube field into bokeh.
The camera and timing were animated to introduce the jersey first, then reveal the scale of the catalog behind it, so the shot tells the configurator story in one continuous move.
Building the scene
A viewport breakdown of the build, from cloth sim and the frosted-glass cube field to shading, lighting and the final render in Cinema 4D and Redshift.
One frame, the whole catalog
A single frame can carry a whole catalog if it's built to. One thing in sharp focus, the rest dissolving into a promise of more.
Knowing what to leave soft is most of the work. If that way of seeing resonates, say hello!
