Thanks to emerging technologies and new software tools, interior designers can finally make a complete switch to 3D design. Becoming completely independent of materials required for your workflow and working wherever and whenever you want is excellent. However, there are still parts of your workflow that need fine-tuning.

Pitching 3D interior design and selling the final design still linger in the air as some of the significant challenges 3D interior designers face regularly. However, designers can overcome them quickly if they start using visualization.

How can you understand the importance of visualization if you have minimal knowledge in that area? Below you can find everything you need to know about visualization, what it is, what benefits it offers to 3D interior designers, and why you should use it.

What is Visualization

Merriam-Webster defines visualization as: "the act or process of interpreting in visual terms or putting into visible form.” The "putting into visible form" part of the definition is relevant to 3D interior designers.

Before, while you still worked with pens and paper, your design deliverables were easy to share. Now, when working with a piece of software, you can print out your designs, but it still isn’t enough.

Visualization in the 3D interior design industry stands as a synonym for various other terms, including 3D visualization, 3D rendering, 3D graphics, and computer-generated imagery (CGI). It offers plenty of benefits to 3D interior designers. For instance, it enables them to create beautiful and immersive digital content. More importantly, content that is as realistic as possible.

The field of visualization has rapidly evolved during the last decade. Thanks to cutting-edge technologies, 3D interior designers can now create mesmerizing experiences and distribute them across different channels, including virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR).

Since it requires knowledge of the latest software and its features, 3D interior designers often have to spend months, if not years learning and implementing the best visualization practices in their workflow. Why invest your time into learning something new then?

It Helps Clients See What Their Space Will Look Like

One of the biggest challenges in the interior design industry is showing exactly how their space will look like. Remember, it is not only about the look but the feel as well. It’s difficult to incorporate both in deliverables that have to look realistic as well, especially if you have no other option but to share your work as printouts, drawings, or sketches.

Visualization helps you tackle all these challenges on the go. When you master it, you’ll be able to help clients see what their space will look and feel like. You can use different sources of artificial and natural lights and adjust them to get what your clients want.

You’ll be able to show them how their space will look like during the day and during the night. The light breathes life into an interior design, and visualization is the only way to incorporate it realistically.

Thanks to access to high-quality textures and customizable objects, you’ll be able to create stunning 3D renders. If you are working on remodeling projects, you can even add a "before/after" spin to your pitch to help your clients see what their new space will look like.

It Makes Communicating Ideas Easier

Incorporating the latest interior design trends and best practices into your design is one thing, but successfully communicating your ideas to a client is another. When you are working with drawings, sketches, or printouts, it’s hard to bring your clients to your idea. Why? Because it’s borderline impossible to show them how your ideas change the space.

Visualization makes this so much easier and convenient for both 3D interior designers and clients. You can have several ideas and share them with your client effortlessly. For instance, 3D rendering walkthroughs are excellent for this use case.

You can create a 3D rendering of your entire design and enable clients to see and feel your ideas as if they were inside the space itself. Thanks to the immersive experience, clients can quickly decide which idea resonates the best with them and share with you their feedback.

The ability to pick exactly the materials, textures, objects, and lighting you want also helps. It can be frustrating to be locked into a set of tools, only enabling you to pass on a small portion of your idea. With visualization, your creativity is the only limit. You will have access to everything you need to bring your ideas to life and communicate them with co-workers and clients stress-free.

Easy to Spot Mistakes and Suggest Changes

There are a lot of back-and-forth processes in the 3D interior design workflow. Once you finish the design, your co-workers and clients can spot mistakes or suggest changes. While there are still some errors in your design, getting a green light can backfire on you and leave your clients unimpressed or frustrated.

As a 3D interior designer, you can use visualization to prevent it from happening. If you create elaborate renderings from various angles to highlight all the crucial elements, it becomes easy to spot mistakes. 3D rendering walkthroughs are even more suitable for identifying errors. It simply places viewers in a natural perspective and enables them to find even the smallest errors that easily escape the eye.

Besides inspection, visualization also streamlines suggestions. Both people on your team and your clients will have a better perspective to assess your design. They can easily make suggestions as if they were making suggestions to an interior that already exists.

"Could you please put this table there?" or "Can you please try with the other shade of gray?" types of suggestions are all made possible thanks to visualization.

Impress Clients With Realism

While 3D interior design is art, its deliverables have to be as realistic as possible. Photorealism in 3D design is a new trend. One that you can see across industries, including architecture, gaming, entertainment, marketing, manufacturing, and more.

You are designing an environment where people will spend a substantial amount of time, whether it is a business office or a home. To buy-in on your idea, clients have to be able to see what you are getting. Fortunately, you can impress them with realistic 3D renders of your interior designs.

To make realistic renders, you will have to invest more time in the design process. For instance, you will have to custom-tailor polygonal models and turn them into as detailed objects as possible. Furthermore, you will also have to use high-quality textures and materials.

To truly create realistic renders, you’ll have to pay special attention to angels, shadows, and reflections of life. The light is the final ingredient you are missing. Finally, when you have it all set up, you can create stunning visuals with the right 3D rendering technique.

Can be Used for Marketing

With so many 3D interior designers and studios on the market, the time has come to think about marketing. A well-planned marketing strategy paired with stunning visuals can help you stand out from the crowd and attract more clients. The visualization can be of great help here as well.

Whether you decide to render a building walkthrough, a single room walkthrough, or renders from different perspectives and different lighting, you can use it all in a marketing strategy. Images are particularly useful if you run a blog. You can use them in your articles to make them more engaging and showcase your work.

Thanks to the latest web technologies, you can also embed walkthroughs on your website and share them with your visitors. Since 3D rendering software allows you to choose which file format and resolution you want, you can easily create stunning renders while keeping the file size at a minimum. It can help you minimize loading times for your clients for the ultimate experience.

Finally, you can use your renders on social media where you can build communities, send them via email, use them to enter 3D interior design competitions online or run them with an online paid ads campaign.

Good for Your Portfolio

The 3D interior designer portfolio tells a lot about you. It shows your work and communicates your level of skill, talent, and expertise. The chances are that everyone who is thinking about hiring you will take a look at it. That’s why you should look at your portfolio as an ongoing project and always be on the lookout for tools and methods that can help you improve it.

3D interior designers should consider using visualizations to enhance their portfolios for several reasons. First of all, visualizations showcase a high skill. Not everyone can bend the light, materials, textures, and objects to their own will via 3D rendering software and choose the right 3D rendering technique.

Then we have the quality of visuals. The high-quality visuals in your portfolio stand as proof of your work, clearly communicating to clients what you can deliver. As we mentioned earlier, when it comes to photorealism, nothing compares to visualization. Your renders will appear as if they were actual shots of the place you’ve designed.

Leveraging visualization to enhance your portfolio can also help you show your progress. It will help clients understand that you are continuously invested in your professional growth and development.

Visualization Supports new Technologies

When choosing a new methodology or tool to implement in your workflow as a 3D interior designer, you should always consider whether it is future-proof. Investing in something that’s soon going to be out of date or simply a legacy method is a time and money poorly spent. Visualization is something that will stay in the 3D interior design field for many years to come.

How come? Simply put, visualization supports emerging technologies. We’ve already talked about how it interacts with web technologies, which enable 3D interior designers to share their renders and walkthroughs online via various digital channels. However, the story about how visualization supports new technologies only starts with web technologies.

What’s more interesting for 3D interior designers is that they also support virtual and augmented reality technologies. Virtual reality can help designers take their clients on a realistic walkthrough and experience and see the new design. VR can be beneficial for projects where designers have to build from scratch or do a complete redesign.

Augmented reality also works hand in hand with visualization to create immersive experiences. It can help clients see in real-time how the new design will affect the current space. It is a mix of virtual reality and reality.

High Level of Detail

As the final reason why should 3D interior designers use visualization, we have a high level of detail. Currently, nothing compares to 3D software and rendering tools when it comes to the details. There’s a reason why this technology is so widely accepted and used across verticals.

If you opt for using visualization, you will be able to create the most detailed designs. 3D software enables interior designers to use high-quality materials and textures, manipulate polygonal objects, and use vivid colors in their designs.

The lighting capabilities of modern 3D software are also impressive. You can create natural and artificial light sources to create realistic and breath-taking ambients. Not to mention that proper use of lighting can help you highlight the essential details of the design.

With the right 3D rendering technique, interior designers can render their scenes and ensure that clients see every detail. The best thing about it is that they can do it from different viewpoints and create walkthroughs or animations.

Conclusion

Visualization is a powerful technique used across verticals. It has found its use case in the interior design industry as well. 3D interior designers should consider using it as it offers several benefits. Visualization can help 3D interior designers easily communicate their ideas, streamline the changes, impress clients, and enhance their portfolios.