Work / Navy Chair

Navy Chair

The Navy Chair was engineered in 1944 for US Navy ships and submarines, built from recycled aluminium to survive salt water and decades of use. Only later did it become a design icon. This personal animation follows that arc: the chair comes out of piles of scrap aluminium, is melted down and rises in its final form.

It started the usual way, with an idea, a storyboard and a lot of hours in 3ds Max. The chair, the studio shots and the core animation are traditional 3D work: modelling, lighting, camera, physics simulation and rendering in Corona.

AI tools had a specific job. The scrap mountains, the molten aluminium, the steam and the transitions would have taken weeks to model and simulate by hand. Nano Banana, Kling and Magnific made those shots possible in a fraction of the time, and they were combined with the 3D renders in DaVinci Resolve. The idea, the direction and the product rendering stayed manual.

For a furniture brand, the project shows what a product film can do beyond a turntable: tell where an object comes from and show its material up close. Tools: 3ds Max, Corona Renderer, DaVinci Resolve, Nano Banana, Kling, Magnific.

Personal project. Not commissioned by or affiliated with Emeco.

Personal project
Product animation
2026

Watch the Navy Chair animation on Vimeo

Title frame of the Navy Chair animation: the chair above a pool between piles of scrap aluminium

3D render of the brushed aluminium seat of the Navy Chair in a dark studio

Animation still of the Navy Chair rising from rippling water and steam

Animation still of molten aluminium dripping from crushed cans

Animation still of water dripping from the Navy Chair legs into a pool

Concept sketch and renders of an aluminium can being crushed, Navy Chair animation

Navy Chair animation shot from storyboard sketch to 3D layout to final frame

Storyboard sketch, 3D layout and final render of the Navy Chair title shot

Wireframe and final render of the Navy Chair backrest

Clay render and final render of the Navy Chair frame

Clay render and final render of the Navy Chair seat edge

Navy Chair

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