Women’s Fall / Winter 2025 Show
Paris Fashion Week
CASE STUDY
LOUIS VUITTON
Last year we were tasked with creating animated visuals for Louis Vuitton’s Fall / Winter showcase at Paris Fashion week. Our visuals were to be one aspect of a live production incorporating set dressing, music, lighting and of course catwalk models. The show was set in a huge central atrium, with all aspects of the production tailored to bringing this vast architectural canvas to life.
Across the walls of the atrium were an array of 50+ windows, each of which were fitted with floor to ceiling screens. Once all the screens were in position and connected together they became a “singular screen” which enabled animated visuals to be mapped correctly on to the different surfaces. The atrium itself was comprised of 4 walls, each one requiring a separate render between 4K and 8K depending on it’s size. Due to the high resolution required, and with the show initially being set at over 6 minutes, this presented a huge technical undertaking for our team.
104 Rue De Maubeuge
Having had initial client meetings, our brief was to create a crowd of silhouetted people that gradually fill the rows of windows surrounding the atrium, the concept being that the entire space embodies the feeling of a stylized train station. The client wanted as much realism as possible in terms of movement, so the “commuters” needed to slowly build on in waves to reflect the natural ebbs and flows present in large crowds. The silhouettes were to be set against animated backgrounds, rich blue gradient washes which moved across the rows of windows and played with the physical space. In addition to the crowd sequences we were also tasked with creating an animated intro and outro for the show, using the configuration of windows to cascade visuals around the space. All the animated elements needed to be synchronized to the different sections of the show playing out on the atrium floor. We were initially told by the agency that this could be achieved by adding walk cycles to 2D characters but after some early exploration it was clear that 3D animation would be required in order to achieve the level of detail in movement the client ultimately wanted.
Commuters
Show Finale
During the initial stage of the project we had to nail down what the different stages of the sequence were to involve, working to a “set” running order provided by the agency. This presented quite a challenge to our team, a project of this magnitude with such a short turnaround would normally have gone through a certain amount of preplanning, rather than going straight to production. With the project becoming an ever evolving entity we soon realized we’d have to think on our feet to efficiently adapt the animation each time the running order was changed. Due to the ever moving landscape, we decided it would be best to work as modular as possible, pre-rendering all assets with an alpha so sections could be overlayed on the animated backgrounds in an edit rather than exporting everything flat out of a After Effects. This gave us as much flexibility as feasibly possible with such a complex sequence and enabled us to react as quickly as possible to feedback as it came in.
To further ensure we had the resource to deliver the project we eventually bought onboard a night team which could implement any feedback sent through late in the day. We were quite often sent revisions after the working day had ended and had deliver a new version the very next morning. Having this extra support meant no time was lost and kept the momentum required to the get revisions in front of the client as quickly as possible.
DRESS REHEARSAL
4 weeks later the project is delivered on time and to spec, in those 4 weeks the project would continue to evolve to a point where what requested in the initial briefing was a distant memory. Ultimately the running order, section durations, animated backgrounds and even the overall look was changed daily until the day before the show. The duration of the final production ended up being over 12 minutes, double what was initially briefed. In conclusion this project really was a playbook of unprecedented curveballs and put the team through it’s paces. It was a crazy experience and taught us a lot, and fundamentally proved above everything else, workflow is absolutely everything when it comes to a delivering a project of this nature. It dictates everything from the depth of creativity to render time, without working efficiently deadlines just won’t get met.
