Pump It

One product story, the built-in pump, told twice across two distinct spa designs: an inflatable model and a foam-walled model. The challenge was tonal as much as technical.

Previous films in the range had a recognisable identity, and the new work needed to feel related but elevated, techier, more considered, more obviously premium. The kind of treatment that signals this is the flagship feature, without abandoning the family resemblance.

Lay-Z-Spa supplied their original product-design CAD files. Cinema 4D handles CAD natively, so the geometry came in cleanly, but design-intent models are rarely animation-ready out of the box.

The first phase was processing the files for production: optimising the geometry, preparing it for texturing, and getting it into shape for the look the project was going to need.

From there the work ran on substantial creative freedom, full lookdev, lighting, texturing, and shot design developed iteratively with James, with stills shared throughout to keep the client aligned on feature accuracy and aesthetic direction.

Built in Cinema 4D with Octane Render. The brief called for a more refined and techy treatment than previous spa films, which translated into a controlled lighting setup, tighter material work, particularly on the pump's mechanical detailing, and deliberate restraint in the motion.

Bubble simulations were handled in X-Particles to give the water moments enough physical presence without tipping into spectacle.

Across two films, two distinct spa builds, and roughly two months of production including revisions and final renders, the goal was consistency: the same visual logic applied to two different products, so the feature itself becomes the through-line.