I thought, as it was Friday, it might be a good idea to have something a little more colorful as most of the recent images seem to have been quite low-key.
This curtain material is certainly colorful and, although I dipped into the mid-century drawer, I suppose it is fair to say that this is a much more modern looking material. I had originally had in mind the idea of a fashion material but the problem then is in bringing it to you since I am still unable to realistically import 3D models into Cinema 4D.
I have to admit that I really like the look of the curtains although you would need to have the right sort of color scheme in order to show them off to their best. I have left the colors as they originally were on the windows in order to show off the curtains.
For a change, the pattern was created in Xara Designer and the fabric was then transferred to Cinema 4D in order to produce the render which was brightened in Photoshop.
Furnishing fabrics are a specialty here at 20th Century 3D and this one was especially designed for this furniture and for this particular set.
You will already know that we have been creating small motifs during the course of this week and one of the motives spilled over onto this furnishing fabric. To be honest, it looked so good and so mid-century that we decided that we couldn’t overlook it and so we used it on this sofa and chair.
The set is a penthouse set created some time back which does show off furnishing fabrics quite well and it gives the furniture and the fabrics a good sense of scale. The colors were adjusted to go well in this set and you can see the result above. You can also see larger versions of this and our other work on our Flickr page which is here.
If you use a pattern with a short repeat then you tend to get a design which begins to look overwhelming, a feature that was not lost on mid-century wallpaper makers.
This is my standard mid-century living room shown this time with what could be a very overwhelming pattern using a short repeat at quite a large scale. Although this appears slightly unpleasant by today’s standards, patterns like this were very much the norm in mid-century rooms. To help make it look a little more acceptable to today’s eyes I have made the colours rather low-key. However, once your eye begins to accept the pattern I think you will agree that it becomes a very appealing design. In addition it does have the effect of making the wall ‘stand out’ in a positive way and emphasise the dimensions of the room.
As mentioned above, the set is my standard mid-century living room and the image was created in Cinema 4D with some slight work in Photoshop. The pattern itself was made in Adobe Illustrator.
You can see larger versions of this and our other work on our Flickr page which is here.
Often mid-century designs are quite outspoken but this pattern is the opposite and yet it achieves just as large an effect.
I suppose patterns like this with a small motif that has a fairly open repeat have always been popular and are just as popular today as they have been in the past. I have recently been engaged in making some motifs like this and so I thought that I would share this pattern with you.
I have created it in several colours and three of them are shown above. I also used it as a fashion material for a dress and you can see this on the Flickr website for 20th century 3D at the link below.
The patterns were created in Adobe Illustrator while the dress and accompanying set is from Daz and the render was created in Daz Studio using the Iray renderer.
I have to admit that I like simple patterns like this with a small motif and a regular repeat and, since this is what I am working on, you may be seeing more of these in the near future. You can see larger versions of this and our other work on our Flickr page which is here.
This is a very simple but extremely effective mid-century style wallpaper developed using original colours from the period.
Simple but bold designs like this were often used in the lead up to the organised chaos that was the late 1960s and early 1970s styles of surface patterns. What I like about this design is that it shows up the dimensions and look of the room without (totally) overshadowing it. Yes, it is bright and yes, I agree, it is bold but the overall look in the room is one of summer and excitement and colour which was a feature of the early mid-century. I know I have said this before but much of the rationale behind mid-century design was a reaction to the Second World War and a desire for smart, new, modern design. I have to say it that this is a feature that appears to be lacking in many modern interiors today.
So, like it or loathe it, it is based very firmly on mid-century roots and this room is the way that many rooms would have looked at the time.
The design was made in Adobe Illustrator while the image was prepared in Cinema 4D using a set which I have used often before, my mid-century living room.
Houndstooth patterns used to be extremely popular mid-century although they seem to be in something of a lull at the moment although, of course, that could all change.
I like the houndstooth because of the small repeat and the subtle differences that occur when you change the scale. It also has a rough, somewhat textured look which, unsurprisingly, appeals to the texture artist in me.
Having given some thought to the original design, I wondered whether it was possible to make a change to the overall look to give a softer feel and to bring the pattern into the present-day. In the second swatch you can see the simple change which I have made and the effect that it produces which, I think, is a little more appealing and, as a fabric, would make it look a little less stiff and starchy. Because the pattern is slightly more open I also feel that it has more possibilities than the original.
Traditionally in black and white, both my houndstooths (or is it houndsteeth?) are a little different in that I have used some traditional colours for the background and the pattern which I think makes them look just a little less harsh.
A glance on the Internet to see what products currently use a traditional houndstooth showed that they are still in evidence. Naturally my first thought was to wonder how these products would look using my version of the pattern although it seemed better to simply show you the swatches rather than try and incorporate them into a 3D design.
The thing that got me hooked into creating textures for 3D work was not the obvious skin or rock textures but period patterns such as the one shown above.
This pattern is a very simple repeat of a small motif which is brought to life by the mid-century colours that are used. These colours are based on the British Standard set of colours created in the 1950s and which were subsequently updated and amended many times over the years and decades that followed. Of all the patterns that I have created recently this is, I suppose, the one which looks the most ‘mid-century’ of all of them.
This set is, perhaps, a new one to you although it is a different view of the living room set created to resemble that of a BBC television series of the time. The room is based on the front room of Bob and Thelma Ferris on the Elm Lodge housing estate.
As ever, the set was created in Cinema 4D, the pattern being made in Xara while there is some slight adjustments made using Photoshop.