Car companies and 3D-Companies – how do they communicate?

[C••••••l]

Hi there!

Not sure if it’s the right place for that kind of question — will give it a try anyway ...

Let’s assume a big car company (like Ford for instance) is about to release a new model. To be able to promote that coming car, they give order to their favorite 3D-Company to produce some nice 3D renderings for them.

All right – I guess this is the usual background of any high-quality car rendering to be used for advertising.

What I’d like to know here is what kind of data will Ford in this case give to those 3D freaks? Is it the exact same data they use for constructing the real car? Or will it rather be some converted data format instead — either, because they may not want to disclose their confidential source data or because that source data is not compatible with any 3D software on the market.

Anybody here who knows about how this is done normally?

Thanks for any clues!


And sorry for my humble English ...

[multimediaman]

The car company's engineers need specs for machines to create the parts from... and it's possible they use a 3d drafting program to do this.

So the possibility is definitely there that the entire car was modeled out by the engineers in an incredibly high detail model from the very base planning stages of the vehicle, and they had schematics and a 3d model before the first vehicle prototype was ever created.

Also, where companies didn't take that option, there's always 3d model scanning, using lasers and optics to scan in a model...

I'd be surprised if any of the car models the manufacturers themselves were involved with creating were ever built from scratch the same way we as artists build them

[C••••••l]

Originally Posted by multimediaman

So the possibility is definitely there that the entire car was modeled out by the engineers in an incredibly high detail model [...]

All right – in that case, is it very likely they might give just that high detailed original data to the 3D company? And if so, what data format could it be?

[The IC]

theyd usually just export it to a format that the 3d studio would ask for (3d studios arent going to own products like CATIA)...which would vary from studio to studio...also, once its exported, its not really CAD data any more, its just a really really dense mesh

@mmm: actually, ive seen quite a few car tv ads and manufacturer web pages where the car was modelled using our lame primitive methods

[C••••••l]

Originally Posted by The IC

theyd usually just export it to a format that the 3d studio would ask for

Wouldn't that be sort of risky? Will there be any quarantee that the exported data is a good enough copy of the original — speaking of all the typical shape details the given car may have?

Originally Posted by The IC

...also, once its exported, its not really CAD data any more, its just a really really dense mesh

So, is there no state-of-the-art 3D rendering software that is capable of importing state-of-the-art CAD data in let's say a high fidelity fashion?

[strg-alt-del]

Here is an interesting link:
eMercedesBenz - The Unofficial Mercedes-Benz Weblog

If you create a virtual car and do some simulation you have to put tons of informations in every single part of it. So a simple model like we did aren`t good enough.
I guess they didn´t use polygons.

[tom120934]

Originally Posted by C••••••l

Wouldn't that be sort of risky? Will there be any quarantee that the exported data is a good enough copy of the original — speaking of all the typical shape details the given car may have?

No, because 3D studio works under a NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement) which guarantee to the car maker that data about the car will not be given away.

Originally Posted by C••••••l

So, is there no state-of-the-art 3D rendering software that is capable of importing state-of-the-art CAD data in let's say a high fidelity fashion?

No, because there is more work for this step than a simple "export / import" process. Surfaces needs to be trimmed, unviewable objects are removed.

Take a look to Thomas Suurland's portfolio (www.suurland.com) This is a typical example of top notch quality renders from CAD models.

[C••••••l]

Originally Posted by strg-alt-del

Here is an interesting link:
eMercedesBenz - The Unofficial Mercedes-Benz Weblog

[Danke für den Link!] Thanks for that link!

Originally Posted by tom120934

No, because 3D studio works under a NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement) which guarantee to the car maker that data about the car will not be given away.

Well, I’d say the only thing an NDA guarantees is that the car maker can hold the 3D studio liable in case of a »leak« ...

Originally Posted by tom120934

No, because there is more work for this step than a simple "export / import" process. Surfaces needs to be trimmed, unviewable objects are removed.

I see. So what measures are usually taken to minimize that kind of work — and to ensure that the result is (still) a valid and true copy of the original data?

[greenvampire]

Originally Posted by C••••••l

Well, I’d say the only thing an NDA guarantees is that the car maker can hold the 3D studio liable in case of a »leak« ...

in theory, but that "leak" ca be anything from the 3D model, to simple information, or even giving their name as a client (if they really want to get anal)
I've known people do work for companies, and not been alowed to even speek of the projects for 4 years afterwards.



I have seen how a big company builds and tests the engineering data on big vehicles (ironically I cant say which because of an NDA) lol
all of the components are built in CAD, each worker will have a seperate section to do (eg cab, chasis etc), they are then all put together into one model, which is then exported into the simulation software that tests everything from suspension, heat wear, and movement stress on panels.

after that im not sure what happens, but my guess is they export a watered down version of the model into a raw format such as dxf and hand it over to the company.

I have worked with this method before, but for water valves rather than cars... I was given a dxf file, had to import it, "clean" the mesh (remove / turn bad edges, smoothgroups, mats), and then render some simple views of the valve.


it basically all works on how professional you are willing to be i guess.... a professional company would never put themselves into a position to get sued for every peny by handing out one of Fords meshes lol

[The IC]

Originally Posted by C••••••l

[Danke für den Link!] Thanks for that link!


Well, I’d say the only thing an NDA guarantees is that the car maker can hold the 3D studio liable in case of a »leak« ...


I see. So what measures are usually taken to minimize that kind of work — and to ensure that the result is (still) a valid and true copy of the original data?

exporting a CAD file to a conventional 3d mesh doesnt suddenly make it change shape and make it innaccurate to the original object, any correctional work is to do with stray polygons and bad edges that happened during the export, which also happens in architectural CAD files...these are just cleaned up manually (as greenvampire said)...these arent changes to the shape, just the structure of the 3d mesh