At Wayfair, we do everything we can to help our customers find exactly the products they need to furnish their homes in the style they envision. But creating all of the necessary elements to allow them to do that is not as easy as one might think. Right now, if an artist designs a new stylistic look for a home from scratch, it takes weeks before we actually get to introduce the products in the market to fit that look. Interestingly, it is not product manufacturing, but the creation of 3D models for these products that is the slowest and most expensive part of this process. There are a few key reasons for this; first of all, 3D models are required for product manufacturing, but 3D modeling software licenses and experience modelers are pricey and hard to come by. Secondly, to create a production quality 3D model (using a software like 3DS Max or Maya), 3D modelers need numerous 2D images of the product from various angles; given this requirement, you can imagine how costly a single rework or a minor change could be.
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