A lot goes into the development of a brand and the launch of a product. What happens behind the scenes is rarely seen and, often, it’s never known who was responsible for the visuals that defined the essence of a brand and the energy put into developing a product. Farago Design is a firm that has been working with top consumer brands for over 20 years, involved in everything from digital makeovers and product launches to brand identity and architectural art and graphic installations. We talk with founder Peter Farago about highlights throughout the company’s history, their design process and how KeyShot has helped set their work apart in an extremely competitive marketplace.

Farago Design

Modeling software used: Maya, Inventor, Autodesk Fusion 360, Cinema 4D
Website: farago.com

Farago Design Highlights
1988 – Created first animated storyboarding application for Mac
1989 – Opened Farago Design in New York
1989 – AVID first client (Garage in Boston)
1990 – Apple Evangelist
1993 – Brand development of Barnes & Noble – from 1 store to 700
1995 – Adobe Evangelist
2003 – Digital makeover of Barnes & Noble
2007 – Created Nook product, software dev., brand
2014 – International projects and partnerships in China and Korea
2015 – Showing conceptual work at TED

What would you say is unique about the design process at Farago Design?
UNDERSTANDING. We have always sold our understanding to clients, and not merely our skills or knowledge. We are proud acolytes of Charles Eames, and we live by his axiom “Never delegate understanding.”

A deep, authentic understanding of our subjects – their principles, their assumptions, and their potential – is central to our design process, and allows us to create immense value.

We are committed to innovation, but new ideas rarely materialize out of nowhere. Instead, the most valuable ideas accumulate gradually, from a profound exploration of the systems, markets, users, and activities that surround any subject.

Trying to execute creatively against any basic principles that you don’t yet understand, or glossing over the fundamentals of a subject, is likely to limit your potential for truly meaningful innovation.

You can trust that there will always be a multitude of bright, innovative, and unexpected ideas that come from adherence to this simple process. It’s a good business model, and it has served us and our clients well.

How has KeyShot helped save time, money or improve quality?
Externally, it’s how we win in a competitive marketplace. The work is beautiful, accurate, and stunningly easy to create.

As Steve Jobs said, “The best simulation ALWAYS wins.” He was right. We just don’t miss when we preview ideas with our clients DIRECTLY in KeyShot. It’s totally portable, and we often give live product demos to rooms full of executives on nothing more than a MacBook Air.

Internally, KeyShot’s tremendous power and elegant simplicity are very attractive to all the teams at Farago Design. Its ability to handle an amazing range of data types makes it perfect for our MAYA poly crew and our CAD team as well.

We use KeyShot’s floating license server to enable all our teams and we use KeyShot Network Render Queue to provide speedy turnaround of complex assignments.

We live in an intensely visual culture. With modern consumers, graphic expectations are very high. Consequently, every visual we create, at every stage of development, needs to meet or surpass those expectations. That makes KeyShot THE most important tool in our arsenal, because it so magnificently renders our thinking.

How did you discover KeyShot?
We first experienced KeyShot (then HyperShot 1.8) at Gnomon University in a great kit-bashing tutorial titled “Robot Design” by Josh Nizzi. Our jaws dropped. Having used V-Ray for years, KeyShot’s speed, real-time rendering and simplicity were, by comparison, astounding to us. We’ve been satisfied users since, and we are truly excited to be riding this tremendous wave of innovation alongside the Luxion crew. We look forward to a future full of innovation and excitement. Congratulations on a fabulous product.

Farago Work:
eReader Prototype for Spritz
Tools: Maya, Inventor, Headus, KeyShot5, Photoshop

VENTO Smart Home product development
Tools: Autodesk Fusion 360, KeyShot5, Photoshop

Packaging Barnes & Noble NOOK
Tools: Cinema 4D, KeyShot5, Photoshop.

Samsung GearS SpeedReader
Tools: Cinema 4D, KeyShot5, Headus, AfterEffects

Barnes & Noble NOOK Product launch
Tools: Maya, KeyShot5, After Effects