ITWales.com

Profile: iCreate

by Sali Earls

iCreate is a Swansea based 3D computer animation company founded by Swansea Institute graduates Dawn Lyle and Jake Major in 2003.

The company have recently completed a number of high profile projects, and have unquestionably proved that there is a market for high-end 3D computer graphics services in Swansea and the surrounding area.

The success of the organisation has turned iCreate into award winners, with Dawn Lyle recently being named Young Entrepreneur of the Year at the 2005 Swansea Bay Woman of the Year Awards.

Fresh from her awards win, Dawn Lyle spoke to Sali Earls about iCreate.

What's the history of your company?
We officially started iCreate in November 2003, shortly after graduating from Swansea Institute. We'd already built up a small client list during our last year at university, doing a bit of graphic and web design for local businesses, so we had a running start. We also had support from Spinout and KEF, which helped to make it possible for us to build the business and take on our first employee in Year 1, another graduate of the 3D Animation course. We moved into Technium 1 in SA1 in July 2005, and took on two more graduates to make a team of five.

What unique products/services does your company provide?
iCreate is a 3D computer animation studio that provides 3D architectural visualisation services to the residential and commercial property industries. In other words, fly-throughs, walk-throughs, photomontages and interactive virtual tours of new buildings.

We build accurate, detailed 3D scale models of new developments using architects' CAD drawings as our reference, and output realistic graphics that enable people to see what a building will look like, long before the first stone has been laid. These visuals are useful in the design process, to support planning permission applications, and for marketing new properties and helping developers to sell 'off-plan'.

What's been the key to your success?
Specialising. Although we always planned to specialise in 3D computer animation, at the outset we offered a wide range of graphics services to a wide range of people.

It took us a while to realise that we needed to focus on what we were really good at - and on what we really wanted to do - in order to win the confidence of bigger clients. So we started to focus on getting 3D animation work, and then defined our niche even more tightly by concentrating all our efforts on 3D architectural visualisation for architects and property developers. This has been the key to our growth so far.

Specialising in one particular field of 3D animation has enabled us to win the trust of larger clients, and become known for what we do among our target market. And it's not a superficial marketing ploy - by specialising we have developed the specialist skills that clients are looking for, and we feel 100% confident that iCreate is the best architectural visualisation company in South Wales.

From here we may choose to develop the company in new directions, and add specialisms in other areas, knowing we've laid firm foundations for the business.

What one piece of outside technology has benefited your company most?
Our render node. Before we got this, rendering was our biggest limiting factor... 3D animation requires a huge amount of processor power to churn out the frames that make the final animation - to calculate the lighting and shadows, reflections and transparencies, movement and dynamics that go into each of the 25 frames needed for every second of playback. (If it takes forty minutes to render a single frame, and you need 25 frames per second, how long would you need to render out a 12 minute animation? And so on.) So investing in a multi-processor render node has really opened up the possibilities.

We're now able to achieve much more realistic lighting effects, and create far more complex and detailed scenes than we could before... and we can keep working while it's rendering, so we're more efficient and productive too.

What one piece of advice would you give to start-up companies in your field?
Be patient. It takes a long time to get a regular flow of profitable jobs coming into the business. In the meantime, treat every job, however trivial or loss-making, as if it's your most important, because it's only on the strength of these that you'll grow. By committing to each and every job, and using every opportunity to develop your skills, you're laying solid foundations for the years ahead.

Where do you see your company going in the future?
Well, for one thing we're not going anywhere. We're really excited about the future of business in Swansea and we hope we can continue to grow the business here. And given our architectural visualisation work, all the development going on in SA1 Swansea Waterfront is obviously a great opportunity for us.

Without losing sight of our architectural visualisation work, we're also keen to start working with television production companies and advertisers, producing 3D animation with more creative potential and broader reach.

Our recent high profile project, A Virtual Dylan Thomas (www.virtualdylanthomas.com), is a step in the right direction, and we're hoping to build on this over the next year.

Find out more about iCreate at www.icreate3d.com.