There’s a reason why museums like to dedicate an entire exhibit to an artist — often, just one piece doesn’t cover the depth and breadth of the artist’s style. That’s why our latest design challenge asked you to submit the four KeyShot favorite renderings you created in 2024.

Nearly 100 submissions later, our judges were dazzled by your talent. We’re thrilled to share with you the best of the very best, plus explanations from the designers in their own words.

Gold Prize: Tejas Mitra

Throughout this year, my journey with KeyShot has allowed me to hone a diverse set of skills, as reflected in these visual creations. Crafting the vibrant orange camera honed my ability to emphasize modern design and render high-quality optics. The utility knife rendering polished my skill in detailing diverse materials, such as metallic and a sustainable composite material, to achieve both functionality and aesthetic appeal. Working on the artistic lamps deepened my understanding of light interplay and intricate design patterns, while the minimalist pink speaker refined my expertise in contemporary, sleek designs. Each piece not only demonstrates technical precision but also showcases a keen eye for innovative design, mastery of lighting, material texture, and an artistic flair, all of which I developed through practice and the sophisticated tools provided by KeyShot.

Silver Prize: Aditya Mehra

About the Rolls Royce rendering: I’m a huge automobile fanatic and have always been fascinated by them. I had been exploring automotive rendering and found it quite overwhelming and tricky to perfect in KeyShot. I sought help from tutorials and did a lot of exploration! I iterated around 20-25 visuals to arrive at this final one. This scene is highly inspired by visuals posted by Rolls Royce for their Drop-Tail, where they included a serene background and skylight. I tried to create a similar aura and gave it my best shot.

All in all, it was a great year for me to step out of my comfort zone and create something truly unique. KeyShot has always been incredibly helpful when it comes to visualizing products. Its user interface is super intuitive and comforting to work with. For me, visualization plays a crucial role in bringing out the true essence of an idea and vision, and this challenge has been a great platform to reflect on my learnings.

Bronze Prize: Sam Weise

My usual approach to creating product renderings is to focus on the materials and to create a image that looks natural, curated but not over stylized, which is shown with the ping pong paddle and jewelery box. But this year I also had to create more technical images showcasing internal electronics for marketing purposes, so to keep the images realistic, I attempted to replicate what we do in the prototyping design process, which is to create external housings in clear plastic.

The other part of rendering is to have fun and push beyond the usual, or have a challenge where you will learn something new. Rendering a surreal image of chair within a forest was that fun challenge, pushing KeyShot to render the environment with 3D assets instead of the usual backplates along with a chance to learn the scattering medium to achieve volumetric lighting.

Student Prize: David Borovic

I am currently a second-year master’s student in product and industrial design. I discovered KeyShot in my first year, thanks to my product design professor. Ever since then, I purchased a student license and have been working hard to become highly skilled in using KeyShot. I even benefited from Will Gibbons’ KeyShot Masterclass, where I learned a great deal, especially about creating materials using the material graph. Since then, I’ve been using KeyShot for every product design project at the university.

Honorable Mention: Fernando Rodarte Castro

These projects were created for great clients and mainly to practice KeyShot tools. That’s why no one of them have the same style: some are very serious like Mirror Health from NY, others prefer a playful style like Piknik from Turkey. As for me, I prefer imperfect realistic textures on white studio background.

Honorable Mention: Jan Warren

Top left – “Electrify the Industry”: This futuristic watch design showcases a vibrant and dynamic visualization of energy and innovation. Encased in a sleek gold exterior, the watch floats amidst a sci-fi-inspired backdrop of pulsating neon rings. The composition evokes a sense of movement and technological advancement, amplified by the glowing halo effect. By pairing photorealistic textures with a hyper-modern environment, the render pushes the boundaries of product design. This piece aims to reimagine a luxury timepiece not just as a tool for timekeeping but as a beacon of modernity.

Top right – “Precision in Science”: This elegant yet striking render captures capsules spilling from a glass vial, each meticulously detailed to reveal their granular interiors. The transparent capsules with purple beads inside highlight a focus on material properties, showcasing realism in texture and light refraction. The soft pink background contrasts with the sharp clarity of the glass and capsules, adding an air of sophistication. This design celebrates the precision and beauty of pharmaceutical innovation, positioning medicine as both a science and an art.
Portfolio Piece: https://www.behance.net/gallery/193385965/Hims-and-Hers-render-project

Bottom Left – “Sculpting Elegance”: A luxurious arrangement of gold rings adorned with gemstones exudes timeless beauty. The intricate detailing of each ring—complete with unique prong settings and varied gem cuts—demonstrates exceptional attention to detail. The gemstones’ brilliance is enhanced by the lighting setup, which creates natural reflections and refractions. The render combines classic elegance with modern minimalism, making it a tribute to high-end jewelry design. It tells a story of craftsmanship and the timeless allure of fine accessories.

Bottom right – “Automotive Innovation”: This render bridges the gap between automotive design and engineering precision. A partially revealed car body merges with its wireframe representation, offering a behind-the-scenes look at the process of vehicle creation. The green metallic surface contrasts beautifully with the cyan-blue wireframe, symbolizing the harmony of design and functionality. The piece captures the raw potential of 3D visualization in automotive innovation, celebrating the journey from conceptualization to reality.