Specifying FFE and Materials for Interior Renderings

In our experience the most common cause of a second production pass on interiors is not a modeling error, it is a specification gap discovered at review. Closing that gap up front is the cheapest thing a designer can do on an interior rendering package.

Surfaces first

Surfaces are where the money is, because they are most of what the camera sees. In order of how much of a typical frame they occupy: flooring, walls, ceiling, cabinetry and millwork, countertops and backsplash, then tile and specialty finishes.

For each one, the useful specification is manufacturer and product where it exists, or failing that the material, colour, finish level and, for anything with a pattern, the direction and scale. Wood species and stain, tile size and grout colour, and the sheen level of paint all change an image visibly. A photograph of the physical sample is worth more than a name we have to interpret.

Furniture, fixtures and equipment

Not everything needs equal attention. We work in three tiers.

• Hero pieces. The items the room is designed around and the eye lands on. Specify exactly, with product references and images. Usually three to six items per room.
• Supporting pieces. Present and visible but not the subject. Style, material and approximate dimensions are enough.
• Accessories and styling. Books, plants, table settings, art. Direction rather than specification. Say what character you want and let it be produced to that.

Where a piece is custom, dimensioned drawings are required rather than helpful, because there is nothing to reference. Custom millwork and built ins generate more modeling questions for us than anything else on interior work.

Lighting is a specification, not an afterthought

Fixture selection changes the geometry, but colour temperature and intensity change the entire image. A warm scheme and a neutral one read as different rooms. Specify the fixture family, the colour temperature you intend, and whether the image should show daytime with daylight dominant or evening with the fixtures dominant. Mixing the two without deciding produces an image that is neither.

Formats that work

A finish schedule keyed to the plan is ideal, since it removes ambiguity about which surface is which. A material board with photographs is workable and common. A shared folder of product links plus a marked up plan works well for FFE. What does not work is a written description alone, because it puts the interpretation on us.

Where selections are genuinely undecided, saying so is more useful than guessing, since we can then produce a clearly provisional pass rather than one that looks final and is not.

The wider handover list is in what an interior designer supplies for a rendering, output requirements in resolution and print specs for interior renderings, and the choice against photography in interior renderings versus interior photography. Plan level deliverables are on 3D floor plans.