# 75% of Ikea catalog images are cgi not photography



## The_Traveler (Sep 1, 2014)

CGSociety - Building 3D with Ikea


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## tirediron (Sep 1, 2014)

Very interesting!


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## Scatterbrained (Sep 1, 2014)

It's not just Ikea.


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## pthrift (Sep 1, 2014)

Blown mind

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S4; probably while slacking off at work


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## 407370 (Sep 1, 2014)

The level of control a CGI artist has over each individual pixel in an image with unlimited resolution is just a evolution in image creating.

The controls used to create these images are exactly the same as the controls you would find on a camera only virtual 3D scenes have unlimited control over lighting and camera position.

Is it a photograph?

Depends on how you define photography.


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## timor (Sep 1, 2014)

So ? Time to start new forum ? How to make perfect images without actually having a real subject ? That would eliminate all the problems with light, DoF, perspective, background, sharpness, colour. All would be as should. And no one would be able to tell the difference. Perfect evolution of photography.


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## usayit (Sep 1, 2014)

If the item is initially designed using 3D computer models, I definitely see the advantage.   Already invested to create the 3D model, why not use it for the catalog too.


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## zaroba (Sep 2, 2014)

Makes sense to me.

And in the case of food pictures, often not the actual food.  Either CGI or plastic models.
Just do a google search for 'food props' and you'll find tons of companies that make realistic looking fake food for use in movies, television shows/commercials, and in-store displays.


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## runnah (Sep 2, 2014)

Scatterbrained said:


> It's not just Ikea.



Most car adverts are the same. Print for sure and lots of the luxury car commercials are cgi.


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## Scatterbrained (Sep 2, 2014)

zaroba said:


> Makes sense to me.
> 
> And in the case of food pictures, often not the actual food.  Either CGI or plastic models.
> Just do a google search for 'food props' and you'll find tons of companies that make realistic looking fake food for use in movies, television shows/commercials, and in-store displays.



No, actually with food they have a team of stylists who will go through hundreds of burgers, buns, fries, heads of lettuce, etc to get the best looking components.  The sesame seeds are put on the buns with toothpics and glue.  The condiments are put on with syringes. The burgers are only partially cooked, then the grill marks are added with a heated metal rod.  The cheese is placed and then partially melted with a hair dryer.   The burger may be split in the back and spread to better fill the bun.  Toothpicks are used to ensure the burger and lettuce stay put.   Everything is prepped with the anticipation that the burger will be photographed from one particular angle.   French fries are often stuck on toothpicks and then positioned in floral foam inside of their regular cardboard package, then steam powder or vapor drops will be used behind the package to make it look hot and fresh.   There are a lot of tricks to commercial fast food photography, but right now it's still mostly real food,  just optimized for photography.


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## Msteelio91 (Sep 2, 2014)

That's pretty awesome. They have an app for helping you choose a layout for your home as well.


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## 407370 (Sep 2, 2014)

timor said:


> So ? Time to start new forum ? How to make perfect images without actually having a real subject ? That would eliminate all the problems with light, DoF, perspective, background, sharpness, colour. All would be as should. And no one would be able to tell the difference. Perfect evolution of photography.



Look at my avatar. The sky, horizon, water and head all contain pictures I have taken and then imported into Cinema 4D as textures and then applied to elements within the scene (exactly as IKEA have done in their product shots). The image is then exported as JPG to exactly the same technical standards as every other JPG posted on this forum. I dont call it photography but the image started in my camera.


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## molested_cow (Sep 2, 2014)

Pretty much every product out there.

There was a grad student who wants to write his thesis on "communication between designers and product photographers" or something like that. I had a laugh, because the need for professional product photography has very small market now. All industrial products are created from CAD files and it's much easier and efficient to get a nice "photo" from CGI. Only craft  based products, such as ceramics or paper crafts will find real photography more suitable.


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## jwenham (Sep 3, 2014)

Pretty eye opening stuff, love hearing about the ins and outs of commerical photography, thanks!


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## molested_cow (Sep 3, 2014)

When I was in grad school, we visited a studio in Detroit area that does a lot of car "photography" for the big three. Actually, most of it was CGI. What they will do is, they will send a team out to the desired site to collect environmental data, such(basically to be able to create a HDRI environment), and then they will render the car in the HDRI environment to show an accurate lighting and reflection.

Sending a team out there isn't cheap(desert, salt flats, mountain, city etc), but sure beats having to ship the entire car there. You can render a perfectly clean car in the desert, which is impossible in real life. They can also collect data at different times of the day to capture mid noon or sunset or night conditions. Also, they won't risk new cars being exposed prematurally in the real world.

But photography is only the easy part. They had lots of servers assembled as render farms to run those high res and highly detailed renderings. After that, they have a team of guys to photoshop it to perfection, also takes a long time.

The same also goes for motion pictures, like tv commercials or promotional videos etc.

They still have full size photo studios to shoot whole cars, but as you can imagine, that's getting used less and less these days.


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## justingrainge (Sep 3, 2014)

In some other parts of the world where a McDonalds job is valued as a great job (India for example) the big mac does look more like burger number 1 than number 2!


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## Borad (Sep 21, 2014)

Really annoying with shoes. I usually don't feel like I'm seeing what they really look like. And I had to buy a kitchen light fixture and couldn't figure out from the picture whether the ends were enameled steel or whether the diffuser covered the ends. Turned out that the diffuser covered steel at the ends and you can see the shadow from the steel when lit. An unpleasant surprise thanks to the non-photo.


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