How Esko’s Studio Helped Nike® to Design Packaging Easier, Faster and Better

Matt Maghan, Production Designer at Nike, is responsible for designing the packaging templates for the Global Football Division at the company, working on anything from inflatable footballs to goalkeeper gloves. He is, in his own words, “passionate about packaging and printing, especially for Nike.”

Matt was looking for a solution, compatible with Adobe® Illustrator®, to make the process of creating and reviewing 3D images of his designs considerably easier.

“We have a lot of departments and project managers that we have to run all the graphics through,” said Matt. “In the past, I have had to try and create 3D images myself using Illustrator® or Photoshop®, and it never looked quite right and was time-consuming from my end. The more time I am rendering out 3D designs, I am not building templates, so it was taking away from my role.”

Matt looked at several solutions, but it wasn’t until he sat down with Esko that he found the exact solutions he had been looking for. Studio is a modular solution, a mix of plugins and applications that work tightly together; integrated seamlessly with tools like Adobe® Illustrator® to help designers accelerate their packaging design.

Studio allows the user to create exciting 3D visuals, ranging from PDF files with 3D content, to movies, to virtual pack shots. It allows the user to see their products and packaging in full 3D before they even physically exist. Other 3D tools can be complicated, taking hours to model and render an image. Studio is fast and easy, as well as integrating with standard tools like Adobe® Illustrator®, it works with real production data to produce the most accurate image imaginable.

Studio even has support for complex multi-piece structures from Esko’s ArtiosCAD – the world’s most popular structural design software for packaging design – enabling users to place structural design files from ArtiosCAD or from one of the Studio Toolkits.

“I realized very quickly that Esko had figured it out – this is something I have needed over the last 10 years,” said Matt. “With Studio, I can just load a plug-in, so I have 3D right there within Illustrator and then I can extract a 3D PDF or a Plotter file. That is exactly what I was looking for.”

Matt discovered that Studio is a fast and easy way to turn ideas into 3D images, whether for inspiration in the design process, to impress internal clients, or to help make key decisions more quickly.

“Being able to build those scenes of what exactly I am looking for and then import that back into Illustrator using my flat die-line art has probably been the biggest game-changer for me,” he says.

“We definitely save time and it has brought a significant increase in my productivity. For example, I was working on a little shoe box and because I already had the design, I already had the die-line for it, I quickly went into Illustrator, clicked a few buttons and something that would have taken three or four hours of a lot of heavy Photoshop work, only took about 10 minutes. That equates to over 80% of my time saved.”

Using Esko’s Studio also saves time in decision-making. For example, Matt worked on packaging for boxer briefs, which had a sliding tray as well as a box. It required 26 different language translations on the box and he had some concerns about space. With Studio, Matt could render it out very quickly and show his colleagues how it looked.

“In 3D, I could spin it around while I was still in Illustrator and we soon realized it wouldn’t be right, so we made the decision to put in an insert,” said Matt. “So now we are making design choices in Illustrator using Studio in a matter of minutes rather than waiting, printing it out, getting it back from the printer, and running it up the flagpole at that point. It has already automatically saved me a lot of time with my reviews.”

One of the aspects that has really impressed Matt is its user-friendliness.

“There is not a large learning curve with Studio,” he said, “especially when you already know Illustrator. I picked it up probably within an hour. What I really enjoyed is the Studio part of it, building the package. In my work, I don’t just deal with one sheet of paper that folds up into a box, they all have trays, lids and everything. So I go into Illustrator, build out my ArtiosCAD files, and build them in Studio, which I always find fun to be hands on with it, then load that into Illustrator. I can show my clients my ideas very clearly.”

• Design: Understand how the artwork will look on the package. Changes are instantly visible.
• Content: Determine if the required content will fit on the package.
• Approval: Secure agreement from all Nike stakeholders using 3D images instead of prototypes.
• Communication: Communicate design intent to external suppliers who will produce the packaging, often in distant locations around the globe.

Studio helps produce better packaging artwork; with Studio you are virtually holding the product packaging in your hands.

Studio is a fast and easy way to turn your ideas into beautiful 3D images, for your own inspiration or to impress an important client.

Studio is available as a software subscription, so you have all the functionality you need, based on your workload, without a big investment.