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Brighton West Pier England : Architecture

3D Visualisation of Famous Structure, England, UK

A Phoenix from the Ashes

Never-seen-before images of Brighton’s West Pier have been released today, allowing a new generation to see Britain’s most famous pier – now a startling ruin – in all its former glory for the first time.

7 Jul 2009

Brighton’s West Pier

Brighton’s West Pier, which opened in 1866, was England’s finest seaside pier and the first to be Grade I listed. It closed in 1975. Since then it has continued into decay, until reaching its current derelict state following a series of fires storms over the past decade.

In April 2009, F10 Studios were approached by Brighton’s West Pier Trust to graphically restore the pier and provide visualisations that illustrated the pier in its heyday.

F10’s brief was to capture the true beauty and romanticism of the much-loved piece of sea-side architecture as it was in 1920.

Glen Bruckland at F10 said: “The first challenge was piecing together the original plans and drawings, some dating back to the 1860’s. Some of these prints had not seen the light of day in years, and the job of pulling all the information together was a huge task in itself. Fortunately local structural engineering firm HOP was also able to provide several digital drawings which assisted with the main structural modeling.

In order for the images to be convincing a high level of detail was essential. The West Pier Trust also provided plenty of reference photography from the 1920’s which were vital for adding all these details. In all it took over a month to model, with detailing going down to individual nuts and bolts.”

Rachel Clark, General Manager of the West Pier Trust, said: “Being able to preserve and showoff to a new generation this wonderful part of British architectural history is extremely important to us. The stunning visuals produced by F10 have done just that, and we are looking forward to working with them on future projects to help our cause.”

Brighton West Pier – Technical Notes

The pier was modeled in 3dsmax 2009 64bit, and rendered with Vray 1.5 sp3. The model is made up of 60 million polygons and extensive use was made of Vray blend materials to recreate the weathered look of years of facing the elements off Brighton’s coastline. The final images are built up of a range of Vray elements, including an AO pass using sp3’s new extra tex element.

Agency: F10 Studios – www.f10studios.co.uk
Client: West Pier Trust
Software: 3D Max 2009 / V-ray 1.5 sp3

For more information contact:
Nick Homer, F10 Studios : nick@f10studios.co.uk T: 01273 323765

Brighton West Pier images / information from F10 Studios

Location: Brighton, Sussex, southern England, United Kingdom

Brighton i360, England
Marks Barfield architects

image : F10 Studios