The University of Albstadt Sigmaringen is one of the few Universities in Germany offering state of the art degrees in Textile and Clothing Technology. This semester the students took part in an exciting, hands-on industrial project, where they were tasked to create detailed virtual sportswear and outdoor garment collections in cooperation with CLO and Inneo. Throughout the 17-week project, led by Prof. Dr. Christian Kaiser and Prof. Marina Baum, the students learned and implemented 3D technologies with the final goal of developing true-to-life virtual garment visualizations.
The students’ experience with CLO ranged from having attained basic knowledge of CLO in previous semesters and internships, to others learning to use CLO from scratch with the help of the University of Albstadt Sigmaringen’s and CLO’s library of video tutorials. Although the level of experience varied amongst the students, all of them achieved their final goal and were able to visualize their designs without having to physically produce a single garment. Moreover, CLO enabled the students to showcase more creativity through their virtual garment development process. We had the opportunity to catch up with a few of the students in order to gain insights about their virtual garment collection, their garment development process as well as their individual experience from the project!
Anna-Lena’s virtual garment collection is inspired by Asian streetwear, “I wanted to create a feminine athleisure collection and incorporated the idea of layering different types of garments.” When asking Anne-Lena how CLO had been of most help in her garment development process, she depicts her fascination for the ease and flexibility of the creation process with CLO, “It is such a fast way to develop new styles! You just pick an existing pattern, do some annotations and you have a new style. Having the 2D and the 3D window next to each other helps you to see how the changes look in the style and makes it really easy to develop stunning designs, without having to switch back and forth between different programs.” She continues, “Many of the features were self explanatory and you find your way around the program quite easily. If you do get lost, the CLO YouTube Channel and the Support Page have almost every answer in stock.“ Her top three favorite CLO features are Superimpose, Symmetric pattern with sewing, and Layer Clone. Having completed an internship in Pattern Development she quickly realized the need for 3D tools within garment development, “I can just imagine how much incorporating CLO could speed up the development process and simplify communication between the Design department, Pattern Making, and the Buying and Sales departments.”
Mark was inspired by city-to-mountain apparel and functional design embedded in a minimalistic silhouette for his virtual garment collection. The most difficult part of the design process, according to Mark, was the beginning, which he describes as a blank sheet of paper, “CLO helped me exactly at this point. I created a rain jacket out of a men’s two button blazer. Since I like the classy look of the blazer jacket, I had the idea to integrate parts of the fitting into the final rain jacket. So, CLO changed my way of starting a new garment by modifying basic pattern simulations.“ Mark greatly appreciates CLO’s 3D Pen Tool, “Drawing directly on the 3D simulation has helped me enormously to create a functional design. With this tool it was easy to adapt the seams of the garment to the ergonomics of the human body.“ Although Mark has experience with other 3D modeling programs, he finds CLO more intuitive than other 3D garment design tools when it comes to garment visualization and virtual garment development, “CLO does it differently. For example, creating a down jacket is very easy in CLO compared to others programs. Overall, it’s easy to handle, has nearly every feature I could ask for and has a very simple user interface – I really fell in love with CLO.“
For Pia’s virtual garment collection, multifunctionality is a big aspect, “Each garment should be able to combine with the others. My pieces are not focused on a specific kind of sport, rather the garments should be able to be worn anywhere.” When asking how CLO has been able to assist her in the garment creation process Pia mentions that CLO was especially helpful for creating tight garments such as sport bras and shorts, “it was a great help to construct the patterns directly on the avatar. This way I could see the results immediately and was able to achieve a perfect fit.” Along with many of the other students, Pia really fell in love with the ability to work on her pattern in the 2D window and directly see the results in the 3D window, “During the entire process, I noticed that I tried out a lot more in terms of patterns and design as everything can easily be changed. I am sure this promotes the creative process and allows great ideas to arise.” Pia is grateful to have had the opportunity to be part of this project and to learn CLO skills, “CLO is now being introduced in many companies, so that will hopefully be part of the daily process from now on.”
Timo’s main source of inspiration for his virtual garment collection is streetwear culture, hip-hop music and skateboarding. His aim was to merge sportswear and technically advanced materials with an urban style. In the beginning of the project, Timo modified the sewing pattern of a jacket, “Thanks to CLO I was able to instantly see the effects of every change that was made and to find the shape I wanted by playing around with the sewing pattern and materials.” He continues, “Normally it would have taken a lot more time to imagine how the 2D pattern could turn out. By working with CLO, the garment is already worn and presented by an avatar which makes the process more interactive.“ Because Timo enjoys seeing his ideas come to life, his favorite feature is the X-Ray feature, “you can adjust the avatar in every imaginable position. The garment moves with the avatar while adjusting it, which makes the entire process very simple.” Through the implementation of CLO Timo was able to obtain a faster workflow and much better output within his garment development process, “I really enjoy working with CLO. I wish I would have known about CLO at an earlier stage, as it’s such a great tool for people that enjoy creating garments and allows users to give free rein to their creativity.”
We are thrilled to support the University of Albstadt Sigmaringen as an official partner for this year’s Industrial Project, enabling these ever talented Textile and Clothing Technology students to learn and implement innovative 3D technologies such as CLO within their garment development process. Through this project, the Textile and Clothing Engineers of tomorrow are able to gain numerous new skills in a subject area that will be the key to the future apparel industry. We can’t wait to see all of the amazing final results!
To find out more about the University of Albstadt Sigmaringen visit https://www.hs-albsig.de/textil-bekleidungsstudiengaenge/.
All interested parties have the opportunity to watch in the final presentation online on Jan. 27, 2021, at 2:30 p.m. CET in an MS Teams livestream accessed via the following link.