Report: 10th annual RTT Conference

Held at the Old Congress Hall in Munich, the 10th annual RTT Conference was a showcase for Realtime Technologies AG's (RTT) visualization products. Entitled 'Sharing Visions', the event was a platform for the established supplier of virtual prototyping and virtual marketing tools to demonstrate the services it supplies to various industries, principal among which is the automotive design industry.

While many of the presentations revolved around the integration of RTT's software to streamline the processes related to marketing and product development, some reflected on the software's ability to facilitate creation and gauge public perception. Conference speakers ranged from designers to product planners and developers from global companies such as BMW, Ferrari, ICON Aircraft, Porsche, Tokyo Design International and Toyota, but the highlight of the event were the presentations by special guest speakers Syd Mead and Chris Bangle.

After an opening presentation by RTT founders Ludwig A. Fuchs and Christoph Karrasch, the conference delved into presentations by the CEO of Tokyo Design International, who highlighted the importance of visualization tools that enable designers to create products that connect with the end user, and case studies by BMW and Ferrari, who shared recent examples of the potential of RTT's software across the Internet and other marketing channels.

Steen Strand of ICON Aircraft gave one of the more interesting design-related presentations, entitled 'The Next Powersport'. Subsequent to FAA changes in 2004, the California-based start-up company was able to devise a new personal aircraft that blurs the line between the antiquated Cessna Skycatcher currently used by recreational pilots and a personal watercaft. Using RTT software, Strand's team was able to validate the amphibious design by putting it in realistic environments - getting more than 300 deposits in the first two years - before the engineering prototype (built from carbon fiber in a scant six months) was even created.

As an interlude to the next speaker, the winners of this year's RTT Emerging Technologies contest took to the stage to receive their awards. The recipients included the Campus Hagenberg University of Applied Sciences in Austria, Politecnico di Milano in Italy and the University of Siegen in Germany. Each took home a high-end graphics card from competition partner NVIDIA.

Following a presentation by Dirk Lerminiaux of Toyota Motor Europe entitled 'Doing More with Less', artist, visual futurist and concept designer Syd Mead shifted the focus off marketing. The CGI pioneer, who achieved worldwide acclaim thanks to his designs for films such as the cyberpunk classic Blade Runner, Tron, Aliens and Mission Impossible III, gave a presentation revealing some of the work he's devised, including pieces he created in gouache (water color). The legendary futurist, whose innovative designs have influenced designers for more than half a century, spoke about concepts, ideas and design stating: "A concept is a box, and you're toying around with ideas that fit into your target."

"There's a big wide world of stuff and it all has to be created by somebody," Mead said, but he did offer a word of warning: "If you don't have a good concept, you'll end up creating a real bad design."

His artful depiction of future societies was punctuated by colorful anecdotes, including that of the 300SL he owned for 43 years and the story behind a sketch he created while he was a student at Art Center, which was inspired by the Chrysler Imperial and featured a rear end design reminiscent of the Bertone BAT concepts.

While going through various slides, Mead said: "Cliché is a language you need to be familiar with in order to go into the weird," before explaining why he always created positive and lively scenarios for the future. "Misery will always be with us," the design visionary opined, "But if you keep rehearsing a crappy future, you're going to have a crappy future."

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By Eric Gallina