The importance of in-house passion projects for boosting studio skills, moral, and visibility continues to grow exponentially as demonstrated in this dramatic film by the Norway-based design and motion team at Futhark Studios.

Turpal Saytiev, CD at Futhark Studios: “We wanted to improve our realism and product renders, so we came up with this passion project. Originally, we started out with a custom opaque PS5 controller design, but we scrapped it halfway through in exchange for the Nothing earbuds.

“The dramatic change was due to the much better product design, which also felt like a much higher-quality product to include in our portfolio. No matter how good a project we make, a PS5 controller will always be considered a low-end gaming product. Meanwhile, Nothing had a great perceived value in their product and branding.
 

“Being a Blender-focused studio also comes with the challenge of making it look realistic and beautiful. Although capable, the software as a tool is not well known for consistently achieving good results with minimal effort with mograph beauty renders.”

 
“Secondly, we didn’t have the product at hand, so we created the models based on online photos, videos, and reviews (anything that showed the product up close). Then came the challenge of getting the glass to feel nice and interact with the lights. This was possible thanks to a perfect quad-topology and even thickness — the glass shader was just a basic glass node from Blender.

“Being a Blender-focused studio also comes with the challenge of making it look realistic and beautiful. Although capable, the software as a tool is not well known for consistently achieving good results with minimal effort with mograph beauty renders.

“The most important parts here were materials and lighting. We learned something new about lighting: use something other than hard-edged square source lights. Instead, use faded edges on the light, like a softbox. This made a big difference by removing those hard lines that often show up when the source light is reflected in glass.”
 
 

 
Production: Futhark Studios
Creative Director: Turpal Saytiev
Associate Director: Mathieu Sanguinet
Editor/Compositor: Mathieu Sanguinet
Lead 3D Artist: Turpal Saytiev
3D Modeling: Ahmed Ashour
Rigging: Richard V. Nosa
Environment Designer: Rahul Chaudhary
Simulations: Benjamin Techt

Sound Design: Immersive Sound
Music: Oliver Michael “City Angels”