SW: Do you think 3D Runway and soft body forms are complementary to each other or should they be used separately?
SM: We are working on incorporating soft body forms in 3D Runway. These actually come in handy when needing to see the accurate projections for tight garments. But the problem with having soft body forms is technical in nature. If there is a stitch on the garment, what happens on the soft body form is that the stitch is pushing the body at the point of contact and the body also pushes back the stitch equally. Two forces pushing against each other never get to a resting point and hence this is difficult to depict in the 3D format. It involves a lot of equations and calculations. But we are working towards a solution and we are sure to find one soon.
SW: Let us say that even after using 3D Runway, the fit of the final sample has to be a physical sample. In that case 3D Runway reduces the iterations only.
SM: Generally for each style, one makes 3 to 5 physical samples. By using 3D Runway you will only have to make 1.5 physical samples per style on an average. So if you earlier made 50 physical samples for 10 styles, with 3D Runway you only need to make 15 physical samples only.
SW: How frequently are the new fabrics coming to the market added to your database?
SM: We are going for collaborations with textile and fabric manufacturers, who are going to provide for our online fabric data bank. Whenever they invent a new or make a new fabric, they will have to use a fabric test kit. We provide the test kit. For all the new fabric, run this test which takes about half an hour. Procedures for how to conduct the test have been written in the manual. It is used to test the shear, bend, stretch and friction of the fabric. The information or outcome that is given by the test kit is fed and stored in a database. Every customer can get access to the data using internet.
SW: How satisfactorily is the drapability of different fabric types being modelled in 3D Runway?
SM: What we use is a 3D engine. It is a complex grid of mathematical equations. Computers convert these equations and make calculations into drapability, how it will look and fall point by point. We have shaders which are responsible for the effect of the light falling on the garment producing high-value pictures with print shadows and perfect rendering. Within two minutes you can have a nice looking realistic picture but when you want to have the shadows and light effect it requires a lot of calculation and becomes complex. We use all the tools and techniques that are used in all the animations in the movies. We have got approvals that our product is the right product for the garment industry.
SW: How do you measure the output of the CAD operator, especially against the situation where he was previously working on physical samples? Are there any benchmarks or standards?
SM: This is one of the biggest problems I face when I go to factories and meet CAD manager. They say manually my operator did 8 styles but on the computer he does only 5 styles. But that is not how you measure it. First of all the accuracy is nearly 100% on CAD. If the measurement of a pattern in one direction is 59.35, it will always be 59.35. But if you make a paper pattern, it is bound to vary on duplication. Maybe it took the guy a little more time to make these patterns but these 5 styles are very accurate. When you use CAD, many times you don’t need to grade again for styles which may be similar to older styles. Also when saying that manually it takes less time to make patterns, no one accounts for the time needed to grade and digitize the pattern later, which when using CAD are done as soon as the patterns are made.