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Gerber recreates costumes for upcoming movie release

Replica costumes to be used for release of the new film The Greatest Showman will be on display at ideation 2017.

25th October 2017

Innovation in Textiles
 |  Tolland, CT

Clothing/​Footwear

The whole process will be demonstrated at ideation 2017 and conference attendees will be able to see the replica costumes, experience the technology and speak directly with the team members who worked on the project.

Challenge

The challenge 20th Century Fox presented was to produce 50 sets of replicas of beautiful and complicated costumes in a very short time frame to support the film’s release. The product experts at Gerber, working closely with their partner Pat Trautman at Global Garment Engineering, accepted the challenge and leveraged Gerber’s products to digitally deconstruct each costume garment without having to take them apart.

The job started by digitising each garment on the Gerber Silhouette table, where pattern files were instantaneously created in AccuMark pattern design, grading, marker making and production planning software. The patterns were simultaneously passed into AccuMark 3D, where they were draped on avatars to validate pattern pieces and review virtual samples. The digital sampling process allowed the team to ensure the patterns would accurately and precisely be sewn together to create perfect replicas.

“Precision as we digitised the original costumes into the patterns was key to achieve the speed and quality we needed to accurately replicate these beautiful garments in such a short time frame,” said Mary McFadden, executive director of CAD at Gerber Technology.

Planning, management and tracking

Prior to project kick-off, photographs, technical sketches, measurements, component details and assembly instructions were compiled within YuniquePLM to ensure planning, management and tracking of each essential step was executed properly and timelines were met.

After the patterns were validated in AccuMark 3D, data was passed to AccuNest to create markers ensuring the optimum yield was achieved from the beautiful and expensive fabrics needed to produce the costumes. Over 22 diverse fabrics were spread and cut.

“By using AccuNest, we were able to achieve a 3-6% improvement on fabric yield which was a substantial cost savings for the project,” said Mary McFadden. A cut ticket was then generated for each of the garments to pass data from technical design through to production. The barcode on the cut ticket transfers all the fabric and marker data essential to efficiently spread and cut each costume.

Cut room

In the cut room at Gerber’s headquarters in Tolland, CT, product experts loaded the fabric, scanned the cut ticket on the GERBERspreader XLs125 where the spread details were automatically transferred. After monitoring the spread, the material was passed on to be cut using the Gerber Paragon HX. At the Gerber Paragon, the cut ticket was scanned again to pull up the marker for each garment. After carefully managing the process and labelling the bundles of cut parts, they were packed and shipped to New York for assembly.

“We are honoured to have completed this project with 20th Century Fox. It has allowed the team to use its expertise and display their pride in all that they have accomplished with our digital solutions offering,” said Mohit Uberoi, CEO, Gerber Technology. “We are all looking forward to the release of The Greatest Showman.”

www.gerbertechnology.com

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