From the first prototype to the final design

These times are quite exciting at IMOTANA and a lot of cool things are happening right now.

Only one month ago - in December 2020 - we presented the first pictures of our prototype and promised to take you on our journey to develop a brand new soccer shoe.

In just one month, we rendered the upgrade of our first design of our IMOTANA soccer shoes.

⬇️ Further down in this blog post, you'll see the steps of how we got from the initial sketches to the final 3D renderings.

Your feedback on the first prototype

What happened in the meantime since December?

• 731 different designs were created in the 3D configurator
• On Instagram and Facebook, we have already been able to build the first community of soccer shoe fanatics.
• In just one month we got 151 comments in social media with lots of ideas and feedback.
• 246 direct messages were evaluated and the feedback collected.
• Over 50 comments on the blog with ideas and questions from you.

After two weeks it was absolutely clear what you wanted:

You want a shoe that you can design yourself and that fits perfectly, but with some improvements.

1. The design was ok, but something extraordinary was missing.
2. The shoe should have a more more aggressive look that no brand has ever shown before.
3. The single elements still seemed a bit too random and should fit better together. The sole, upper and heel area should be one design concept.

This is what we did

Over Christmas and New Year's Eve we have intensively discussed with all our fans, newsletter subscribers and supporters and evaluated the individual suggestions, your critics and optimization ideas.

Since we want to launch the soccer boot as early as April 2021, we couldn't waste any time.

Benjamin - one of our founders and the man in charge of soccer boot development at IMOTANA - has therefore been working relentlessly coming up with new designs.

Here you can see the result and how the design evolved from the initial idea to the final design.

Step 1

At first, Benjamin worked on new ideas in the classic way with pen and paper.

This allows you to quickly implement ideas, discuss changes in the team and try out new shapes.

The result doesn't win a design award yet 😎 but it all starts from here...

Step 2

In the next step, he would transfer ideas to his iPad. 

For the development of the IMOTANA soccer shoe we relied on the app "SketchBook".

That software makes it super easy to work out and refine designs with an iPad and an Apple Pencil.

You can see where the journey is going, but there is still a long way to go until the final 3D rendering... 🏃♂️💨 

Step 3

These sketches and 2D designs then go on to 3D rendering.

We rendered quickly to see if an idea looks good in 3D without having to build an expensive prototype.

We also ask ourselves: Are there areas that still need to be adjusted and do single elements fit together?

Rendering is much more time-consuming than a sketch.

Because here the shoe must be built from all its components in 3D:

• Every single studs and the sole
• The different knit zones on the shoe
• The upper and its mesh form
• Every lace and every little detail

After one week, we had the first simple preview of how it might look on a shoe in 3D. 

Sure... the surface here still looks relatively flat and without structure...

...but at this stage we wee able to say that we were on the right track.

Step 4

Several re-shifts and an elaborate computational process later, we then completed the design process after 2 weeks.

After many work steps you can see the final design here, on which we will build the next prototype.

Design version 1 (side view):

Design version 1 (rear view):

Design version 2 (side view):

➡️ What is your feedback on the new design and what questions do you have? 

Just leave us a comment below the post and we look forward to your feedback!