RUNGIS, France., October,4, 2018 –Stratégies Romans CAD©™, a leader in CAD and PDM software used in footwear and leather goods business, and X-Rite Incorporated, a global leader in color science and technology, announced today that Romans CAD©™ natively supports the Appearance Exchange Format (AxF™). Developed by X-Rite, AxF is a vendor-neutral format that enables the communication of all aspects of a physical material’s appearance – color, texture, gloss, refraction, transparency, translucency, special effects (sparkles) and reflection properties – in a single, editable file to improve design virtualization. AxF allows Romans CAD©™ users to leverage the most accurate physical material representations to achieve a new level of realism in virtualization while streamlining design and approval cycles.
“The use of 3D/PDM digital platform in the footwear and leather goods industries is now a strategic element of brand development,” said Jean-Pierre Pédeboy, CEO of Stratégies.
AxF is the foundational component of the X-Rite Total Appearance Capture (TAC™) Ecosystem, a solution that brings a new level of accuracy and efficiency to the capture, communication and presentation of physical materials in the virtual world. Traditionally, the capture and rendering of complex materials such as special effects paints, meshes and fabrics have been a time-consuming and manual process. TAC addresses this challenge with a new level of precision in material scanning coupled with an ability to share the resulting data, via AxF, across an expanding set of rendering tools and CAD/PDM systems such as Romans CAD.
““Integration of AxF in Romans CAD answers the need of the industry of digitizing the product development and design process, taking physically correct materials into real-time visualization. Moreover, this consolidates the value proposition of both AxF and Romans CAD by streamlining workflows and making physically correct material communication seamless” says Dr. Francis Lamy, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, X-Rite and Pantone. “The TAC ecosystem and AxF allow Romans CAD users to visualize their creations using physically correct digital materials providing a new level of unmatched level of colour and texture accuracy”
TAC Brings Material Appearance Technology to the Footwear Industry
The TAC ecosystem is comprised of the TAC7 scanner, PANTORA™ Material Hub desktop application, and Virtual Light Booth (VLB). Physical material samples are scanned using the TAC7 scanner, which captures appearance properties digitally to create AxF files that store appearance data. The files are stored, managed, viewed and edited in the PANTORA desktop application. The AxF files can be shared with Product Lifecycle Management (PLM), Computer-Aided Design (CAD) and Product Data Management (PDM) systems such as Romans CAD©™, and state-of-the art rendering applications.
The Virtual Light Booth is the industry’s first immersive 3D visualization environment for evaluating material appearance. It allows users to accurately compare physical samples and digital renderings side-by-side under the same perceptual conditions – from illumination to contextual to observational factors. This helps ensure consistency between digital prototypes and final physical products and empowers designers to make more informed material selection decisions reducing approval cycles and accelerating time to market.
About Stratégies
Stratégies is a global leader in development of CAD/PDM software solutions for the footwear, leather goods and furniture manufacturing industries.
Founded in 1988 by a group of inspired engineers who realized that the use of 3D software to create and develop 3D models could become an invaluable tool to streamline shoe, luggage and furniture manufacture. The Romans CAD©™ project was developed right after in conjunction with luxury shoe manufacturers.
In 1995, the first 3D shoe software was released on to the market, with a comprehensive set of complementary products, such as 2D, SL, Lumière, 3D Sketch, following in subsequent years. This set of programs is natively integrated in to the Product Data Management program, RCS DM (PDM). RCS Data Management has now become the central driver of productivity for Stratégies customers.
Stratégies is dedicated to utilizing the most up-to-the minute IT technology to provide the highest quality software and related services to its customers. Romans CAD Software is the technological driving force you have been looking for. Using RCS software will provide a guaranteed real and quantifiable return on your CAD/PDM investment that will continue for many years to come. For more information, visit: https://www.romans-cad.com/ .
About X-Rite
Founded in 1958, X-Rite Incorporated is a global leader in the science and technology of color and appearance. Together with the wholly owned subsidiary Pantone, X-Rite employs more than 800 people in 11 countries. The company’s corporate headquarters are located in Grand Rapids, Mich., with regional headquarters in Europe and Asia and service centers across Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and the Americas. X-Rite offers a full range of solutions used by manufacturers, retailers, printers, photographers and graphic design houses to achieve precise management and communication of color and appearance throughout their processes. X-Rite products and services are recognized standards in the printing, packaging, photography, graphic design, video, automotive, paints, plastics, textiles and medical industries. For further information, please visit www.xrite.com.