Albert:

Hello everyone. Welcome to hundo.xyz, your locked in with myself, Albert, who is the. Social media coordinator and graphic designer for hundo, as well as being a character designer and illustrator and an animator outside of work. And I'm here with the lovely speaker today. Would you like to introduce yourself?

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Melisa:

‍Yes, of course. Hello everyone. Uh, I'm Melisa Cilli. Uh, I'm a digital fashion designer and I'm based both Milan and uh, London. I have a background in both fashion and textile design and computer engineering, uh, which has given me the. Great insight, uh, into how creativity and technology can overlap. Uh, currently I'm working at the frontier of the fashion industry as a digital fashion designer at Dress X.

Um, and additionally, I am also laying my foundations for my own venture loophole, which aims to assist the traditional fashion companies in transitioning to digital to the, uh, digital realm. 

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Albert:

Oh wow. Sounds like you're doing so many different things, Melisa. Wow, that's such an influence. Gotta return it back, you know?

But yes. So let's start things off. So how did you get into Digi, into the digital fashion space, and what exactly does it mean to be a digital fashion designer, and how does it differ from the traditional fashion design? 

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Melisa:

Okay. It is a long story short. Initially I did my education as. Yeah, education as physical fashion designer actually, because in my university's curriculum there were no courses related to digital fashion design.

And after my graduation from university, while I was doing my, uh, freelance project, uh, for a background from Paris, I found it so inconvenient to draw a back in the program created for the. Two dimension images. So I searched for a program which, uh, could do 3D design for the 3D project, and I can say that my adventure for the becoming a digital fashion designer.

Begun from that, that point. And, um, you asked the, what is the digital fashion designer Albert? So, uh, digital fashion designer, what does it mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. What does that mean? Uh, everyone, uh, wonders this. So a digital fashion designer creates the garments in her or his digital atelier from the beginning.

To the end. So, um, but in this digital atelier, um, there are similar similarities for the physical fashion. Uh, you do the pattern, uh, you do the pattern creation, pattern cutting, stitch, stitching, garment placed on the model. So this garment also like, um, can be adjusted for the, like, achieve the desired look like a physical fashion.

But the biggest difference, uh, to traditional fashion is that you cannot interact with digital fashion creations without using some kind of a human machine interfaces, like a cameras like, um, smart screens or virtual reality vrs. Uh, but in, uh, living the physical realm behind the need avenues for creativity, let's say, opened the normal rules, uh, of the world.

Such as like a gravity do not have the to be applied in this digital area. So you can create materials like, um, properties you could imagine. So like, uh, water or like a wind. You can do, you can put these, uh, effects or these, uh, elements to your design as well. Um, and this like a. Utterly fantastical and magical, uh, or something more simple, uh, such as a clot with different elasticity, um, and weight, um, can be achieved with the, cannot be achieved with the physical fibers.

But for the digital atelier, you can all achieve these ones. I can like, uh, uh, describe like this to be a digital fashion designer or what is a digital fashion. 

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Albert:

Yeah, that sounds like so interesting and so insightful as well. But even like, even here you speak, it reminds me of like how, like even streetwear brands, they're trying to incorporate like digital fashion into like promoting their t-shirts or clothing as well.

Like those one guy that I saw named Giovanni X extremes and he, he uses, he create like a 3d avatar and like, He also placed his like clothing, like his t-shirt, short socks, shoes. Well, he didn't make shoes, but he created like, like trainers and like to promote, to promote his brand and also like let them people know that he's selling as well.

And I realised that that is such a unique way to do it as well. And I've also been realising that you can also, um, do this on Blender as well. Which is a free, free open source software so that anyone can be able to use as long as your computer's powerful or enough. But yeah, but like this is, that's another thing, but it's like really, like it really helped, like hearing you speak like really helped me like change my viewpoint on digital fashion.

Like it doesn't even have to be like, 2D as well. You can even like create like, I mean free, they can even like make like 2D character designs as well. If you wanna like promote your art too. Or your fashion as well. Like have that animated to 

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Melisa:

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. 

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Albert:

Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. And what software did you, did you use during your university degree that helps you start out in a digital fashion?

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Melisa:

Um, actually, um, in my. Um, in my school, they, in my university, let's say academia, there, there wasn't any, uh, digital fashion. Um, I programs, they, I all self-taught myself, so all the tools I, uh, taught myself. So yeah, there wasn't any in the. My, uh, my university. 

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Albert:

Okay. So it was like an entrepreneurial mindset you had then.

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Melisa:

Yes, yes, yes. Like that. Yeah. Like that Albert. 

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Albert:

Yeah. Um, yeah. Can you provide some, some insights and tips on how to transform from physical fashion design to digital fashion design? 

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Melisa:

‍Um, I can say that the key point is, Try the new tools near digital tools, let's say, because there are plenty of programs emerging and you need to keep track on and explore and experiment as much as you can.

This is the one of the key points and always beyond the lookout for the NIV developments, as I just told, and develop your skills in the established software zone of the digital fashion design. So I think this is the. Crucial part for the, yeah, for this, uh, for my insight, let's say this is the, the best tip I could ever give 

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Albert:

Given you hear that guys always try and make best of the tools given to you so you can make that transition if you wanna make that transition from the physical to the digital, or always make use of these tools and even expanding at that point, like what sort of essential tools that you use to de what source tools and software do you use to design your stuff?

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Melisa:

Mm-hmm. Um, so Albert currently, uh, the program that I use is the CLO3D mainly. So, but they're like a supplemented with, with software such as Adopt Substance. Uh, As you said, blender, that's 3d. These are the the ones that I use like often developed to garments beyond what could achievable in CLO3D alone.

And in terms of the hardware you are going to need, as you said, reasonably. Powerful computer and, uh, CLO3D simulates the fabrics. And this take comp computational power actually. And when you come to rendering, this is another crucial part. The speed is DataMine by the strength of your graphic graphics processor.

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Albert:

Uh, thank you for sharing. Thank you for sharing that, Melisa. So like, you see, it was like you just say CLO3D. 

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Melisa:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Clothes is the, okay, is the crucial one.

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Albert:

I never, never heard of that software before, so I might have to look into it in case wanna do like my own fashion design. If I wanna start, start selling my own merch as an artist and maybe try and look into that to create, like to emulate that, like a 3D fashion show or something like that.

One day. I also wanted to ask Yeah, like, um mm-hmm. What sort of like materials are you able to achieve using CLO3D? Is it like the whole range? So like from cotton to denim to, yeah.

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Melisa:

You have everything. And you can also, um, like, um, import the like fabrics that you did. From the other programs like, uh, other substance you can get, um, all the texture maps, all the normal maps, everything.

You can take it to the CLO3D as well, or you can also create the fabrics in CLO3D or prints or, uh, anything you can do in the, as a fabric. But as you know, not all the programs, um, designing programs has the same background. So, Sometimes you need to have kind of like a rigid object, like a ring or like, uh, some kind of tiara .

So you need to use, um, another program and you can import it to the CLO3D CLO3D is a real physical atelier for a digital fashion designer. The, the same physical, um, how can I say, same digital atelier of the physical session. So you can do the the same things. Exactly. 

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Albert:

No, thank you so much for explaining that to me and the many other people who would be viewing this as well.

Like, cause like it was always like handy to get into insight so you can like be able to like get started at, for those who really want to get into that fashion where it be physical or digital. Then like be, it was like really good to get like a good insight to actually actually Kickstarter cause you open a new program.

And next thing you know, your mind's just rambling. Like how does this work? Like what can you create for me that even a blender like you just get a donut tutorial, but you never know that you can, you can never know that you can create buildings as well.

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Melisa:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We all have the same steps to learn about new programs, I think. Yeah. It's a little bit like that.

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Albert:

Yeah. But I appreciate you for even like giving us a little insight into that as well. Yeah. Yeah. You're welcome. Alright, thank you. And what are the key skills, uh, moving on? Like what are the key skills and abilities needed to become a successful digital fashion designer?

Mm-hmm. 

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Melisa:

So, um, firstly you need to know half the, construct a garment. This is the very crucial point. And the other words, you, you need to know how to like, uh, how to. I have to know the pattern making and how to stitch a garment, for example. And first steps are very si similar with the physical fashion.

The only difference is you are doing these things in your digital atelier. I just said about that and which is, is in a computer program, you are not like a drawing by hand the pattern, but you're drawing the pattern in your program. In the digital atelier, you're cutting the pattern in your digital atelier.

You just stitch it. Again, in the digital, like a computer program, like a cloud reading and um, as well as construction, you have to know about the digital fabrics and how to create them that I just mentioned. And besides creating original concepts, you need to now have the skills to realise them. So, Uh, the, finally, the, the final thing is you, the, the crucial point.

You need to know how to rendering. This is the very important thing for the, like, uh, to finish your project. Mm-hmm. 

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Albert:

‍Mm-hmm. Yeah. So when you say renderings, making sure you use like the right engine cycle. Cause I know there's that e ev and that cycles on blender and like each engine gives, each render gives out different results. Right. 

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Melisa:

Yeah, there are plenty of rendering options and you need to choose your own self according to your project, which one you need to use. Uh, I'm not using every time the sa same rendering machine or same program, so I, I understand my design and I thought that, which one? Is the better choice for the rendering this, uh, project.

So I cannot say this is better or this is worse. I can only say that this size according to your project. 

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Albert:

Yeah, most definitely. Um, for those who are looking to know, like what are like the differences between the different results, if you to like alter the engines, the engines using the rendering. Like, how would each, like let's say you have one project, let's say you have one project and you have, you decide to render using two different rendering options to um, see if there's a difference. What sort of differences would there be between the each render? 

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Melisa:

So I can talk general generalise, uh, because it is like, uh, if you would like to, um, render a beats or the, like a kind of embroidery. You should select the ones who just understand the texture and understand the, um, the weight and, um, height, um, calculations better.

So you should choose that one to take the goods, um, output from your project. Because in the program, as you know, this is the three dimensional program, and rendering means it takes the. Three, uh, takes a 3D input and gives the 2D output. So in this case, the, not only the, uh, the project, but also the lights and the textures give the, like, uh, importance when the ranging processing, so, You should choose, uh, what is important for you, and you need to then, um, take the output according to your preference.

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Albert:

Okay, so basically choosing the right rendering options that gives you the best result, depending on what process you used for the output, basically. Exactly. Ah, thank you so much. Cause I'm con, I've done rendering before, but never from like a fashion perspective. So it's more so from animation or like digital illustrations or even video editing.

So like, to see, to see it from like a fashion perspective is like really eyeopening. Cause like I'm only used to like random from like MP fours to like m like mov even like using. Cycles or EV when it comes to blender on like 2D and 3D animation. So it's like just so mad to see like how like detailed like rendering can be depending on what, what product you create as well.

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Melisa:

Exactly. 

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Albert:

Yeah, exactly. And when you say, like also going back to the point you said that in terms of like constructing the clothes together, is that the cut and sew process? 

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Melisa:

Yes, there is also, there's also cutting in, um, stitching, sewing process as well. So it is a real, real atelier. 

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Albert:

Okay. I appreciate, appreciate you explaining that one, that one there Melisa.

And moving on to the next part and moving on to the next point. Are there any specific courses, certifications, or educational programs that can help? Helps individuals in their journey to become digital fashion designers. 

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Melisa:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. There, there are plenty of them. So for example, on YouTube, you can find so many dedicated videos for all of these fashion design programs and they're free.

Um, so yeah, these days they're like, uh, going more and more. So like before you couldn't find that much. But right now, because the program, um, the computer programs is just. Going, uh, so, so much. They also put so many videos and, um, also there are certificate courses like, uh, on Coursera, uh, domestika, um, and other online. Uh, online course providers like Udemy is another one. So if you wanted, you can, uh, check these ones out as well.  

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Albert:

Uh, thank you. And are you able to, um, spell out Domestika and Coursera as well for those that, for those who may be listening in as well? 

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Melisa:

Um, yes, there are like, um, uh, online course providers and um, there is like some chargers for the, some courses.

You can type the digital fashion design and you can check, uh, which one you prefer or which one is better for you. You can see them all. 

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Albert:

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And what types of jobs do you see emerging and evolving now and in the future of digital fashion? 

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Melisa:

That's a good question. So I can say that according to my vision, uh, in the very new feature, uh, digital pattern making, Is the one of the item jobs, the digital textile designer to make the, the fabrics or digitise the fabrics.

A virtual stylist, because we have so many like, uh, digital assets and someone needs to be styled them and make the some kind of looks. And virtual photographer is also important. Uh, virtual set designer. Um, Digital, um, assets, fashion, digital fashion assets, renderer. Um, yeah, they, they, they will be, they would be the emerge in digital design fields. I assume. 

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Albert:

That's so interesting to see like there's so many like job opportunities out there for those when get into like digital fashion as well. Cause I remember when I started uni I never thought this would be possible cause like obviously like other people seeing other people around me like. Like, obviously there's art illustrators, just digital illustrations, but from like the fashion point point, like I was only seeing like fashion photography, like I wanna be like a fashion stylist.

But that was more from a physical perspective. But I never thought that there'll be one day like a digital. Digital fashion show, digital fashion stylist, that virtual photographers as well. Like, can you imagine like just being at home and being able to just take photographs in the own, in your, in the comfort, your own room.

Just like one little screenshot and then that's like next thing you know, your, your own vogue or something like that. 

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Melisa:

Yes. Yeah, it's very, um, I don't know. I'm really excited to see these things becoming, yeah, 

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Albert:

same, same like even like digital pattern making as well. Like wow, like you can really like put your, like really get paid to do something that you love as well and like, Even those that may not, I know what the most convenient thing is.

You can really work around with people from all around the world. Like me and you we're chatting. Right now I'm based in London and you're based in Milan. Like that could be like another opportunity for like many other people as well to be really connect with people worldwide from all different walks of life as well.

So it's like one way, like incorporating like different cultures to one another and like helping each other out as a team. 

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Melisa:

Exactly. You can, you can do anywhere from the world, even though you can do from the Mars or from the moon. This, uh, this is like a, you need a very powerful computer and that's all you can do.

Anyway, this is the the best thing. You don't need to go to the atelier each day in the morning and leave it in the midnight. So yeah, it is really, really powerful. 

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Albert:

Yeah, wake up, open up your laptop, do your work, chat, communicate. Next thing you know, work done, you gotta close your laptop down and you even gotta worry about like traveling back in the commute as well.

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Melisa:

Exactly. Yeah. So true Albert.. 

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Albert:

I try, I try. Moving on to the next part. Yeah. Uh, what, what are some of the effective ways to network and build connections in this industry? 

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Melisa:

Yeah, for the physical one, it was a little bit hard to go in the that circle, but fortunately in the digital fashion it is decentralised. So there are plenty of people you can connect with and for sure there are plenty of ways to achieve this.

But in my opinion, uh, enrolling online events, uh, joining digital fashion brands, discord channels. Um, connecting people on LinkedIn would be the, like very first steps to, uh, into the digital fashion industry. 

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Albert:

Yeah, yeah. Like discord is like really community based. Cause I've joined a few channels on this discord, or I never, uh, to this day I've had it since like 2019.

And to this day I still never got around to it. I've used it for like with friends to play among us. I remember like lockdown era used it, um, used it for like, um, like common convers com part of All Star community there as well. Meeting people arrive from like New York to Australia. And also using it for like anime communities as well.

Like just like a group of people who love anime to come together and it's like, I never really got, like, obviously I can see like the value in discord as well. Cause like you really get to like, make new friends, meet new people and like even like make new connections as well. Like it can even like help you out in the future too. Yeah. 

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Melisa:

Yes, it's is. Really good to have these opportunities in our times. So, because before it wasn't this much easier to know the people get to know the people all around the world. So right now we have this chance to. Um, know so many people. 

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Albert:

Yeah, most definitely. And do you use Discord yourself, Melisa?

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Melisa:

Um, personally, not so much actually because, uh, I, I have so many messages and so many going on from the, all the platforms. It is keeping track of all of so hard. If I, if I have something to. Get done in Discord. I talk with the people, but other than that, I'm not like a daily checking my messages actually, because they have too many.

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Albert:

Yeah. And you don't wanna feel like overstimulated and overwhelmed as well. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And like even got like some additional questions as well. And, and that is, are there any environmental advantages? To digital fashion over traditional fashion?

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Melisa:

Oh yeah, of course. So many. I can talk till tomorrow morning because this is one of the things that I choose the digital fashion to not give harm to, to the world anymore because I love fashion.

But I know that fashion industry gives the most, one of the most, I think second, uh, in a like a, Feel that the giving is so, so, so much harm. So for example, when you think about in the physical fashion, when you think about to, um, produce a t-shirt or this blouse, let's say, yeah, this white blouse. So for this white blouse at least, you need to do 10 to 15. Uh, Like another templates, but the examples to make it perfect and each time you need to cut the fabric, you need to stitch, you need to check on the mannequin. And if you don't like the, for example, the neckline, you need to do it again. But thanks to the. Digital fashion tools, you can do this process in the digital fashion, atelier,.

And you can only do like a one blouse or at most, two blouses to understand, because in the. The programs that I use, you can even understand the how much, the elasticity, elasticity of the fabric and how does it look in the body, and if the body is like, um, so like, uh, blocked by the fabric, you can see the, all the maps if there's something wrong. So in this case, To be taking the digital fashion tools into the physical fashion for sure. To make it like, uh, shorter to the process of the designing. And it means that the, making the templates for the, uh, fashion pieces. It'll be like decreased. And in this, in this case, you don't use the water more, you don't use the fabric more, you don't use the electricity more.

So this is the best thing. And also the second thing for the fast fashion, uh, nowadays, because we have so many Instagram poppies and Instagram, uh, characters, they all put the things only for the ones to. Um, their buddies to only take a photo and after taking that photo, that dress also useless for them and they given, or they just put in a trash. It's not important for them, but for one piece of the clothes, you just, um, to produce you, you just like use so many waters, so many electric, so many things, so many, uh, resources. You, you just use. And after this point, if you use the only the digital garments for your. Photos, like what, what we do on dress X, like, uh, you can put the digital fashion pieces on your photos and you can directly share with them on your social media that like, uh, in the reality you seems like you, uh, just wear them.

So this is another thing that digital fashion, um, is better in this case, but for sure we are all human beings and we need to wear something to like, um, protect, protect us from the cold, from the sun. Yeah. We, we need some like things. Yeah. Yes. Digital fashion, never, like it takes the physical fashion's place for sure. But. I wanted to, I would like to see that physical, uh, the digital fashion takes to the fast fashions, uh, place. Because what, what is the worst thing right now for the world, for the environment is the fast fashion for sure. 

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Albert:

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I feel insightful. Cause like if you're basically saying like, in terms of creating digital fashion, like if you make more mistake, you can just click Control Z and just undo, and if you don't like it, you just delete the file. Like no harm's being done to the environment whatsoever. 

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Melisa:

Exactly. The only things that you, you just like, uh, produce for the, you just uses the electricity for sure because you are using in the computer. But I don't think so. It is much worse than the, the water and the other, all the stuff in total. Because when you're comparing, uh, the, the power and the electricity, I think little than the other things. Yeah. 

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Albert:

And like even some house, we even got solar panels now. Exactly. Exactly. So even using renewable energy, 

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Melisa:

Yeah, you can put some kind of panel next to your computer. So why not? 

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Albert:

Yeah. Trust cha. You've got another additional question, and that is, are there any exciting examples of digital fashion being augmented with real life experiences such as shops or on social media? 

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Melisa:

Yes, there are plenty of them. Uh, plenty of them. And you can see them on Instagram on like other platforms. So for example, last, um, couple of months I think, uh, Tommy Hilfiger made this one on the. On their shops. It's like a kind of the, uh, mirrors, like a smart mirrors. And when you go to the mirror, you can just check the different, uh, clothes, like a swiping, swiping up, and uh, also, uh, dress doing so many different things for the, uh, augmented reality. With your phones, you can just. Check the things, uh, that you already have and you can see that on your body.

And also Nike and Adidas also made some like, uh, shoes. Uh, you can with the screen of your, um, smartphone, your like, uh, phone. You can see them in your, uh, in your feet. And also not only the fashion brands, but also the makeup brands like Mac and the other brands. They also done some kind of like, um, um, like lipsticks. You can just see on the screen lipstick, they're like filters on Snapchat. Exactly. So I, uh, I think so many people are using them, but they don't know how they call. So when you said like, ah, this is, uh, ar, or this is vr, they're just, What, and I said that you already know you're using them and also in Instagram you are using some filters, some kind of things. They're all the like a similar thing. Similar technologies, 

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Albert:

Yes. Just like, like new term, new terminologies, right? 

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Melisa:

‍Yeah, 

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Albert:

exactly. That's the same as well for, this was just a Snapchat filter. What do you mean augmented reality? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's true. Yeah. And finally, last but not least, do you have any advice or recommendations for individuals who are passionate about digital fashion design and want to pursue a career in this field?

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Melisa:

Um, yes. I have so many, but I will say few right now. So I just suggested, uh, they learned essential programs that I just mentioned and if they enjoy using it and like working in this, Way they, they then they can keep going on and, uh, always be on the lookout for the next opportunities and technologies that I already set because they are rapidly evolving and the, the digital fashion design is the evolving industry.

It's not like, uh, Staying. Staying. Staying because we are using the computer, we are using the programs, we are using rendering, we are using the technology. We are not using the like stable things. It's like all evolving. So they need to. Um, like, uh, on the track, always, 

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Albert:

uh, Melisa coming through them gems once again, thank you for all the advice and, uh, even that one bonus question.

Yeah. What's the most, do you have any exciting projects you're looking forward to with loophole? Uh, okay.

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Melisa:

I'm looking forward to how virtual I'm in VR and augmented. AR red, augmented reality ar will improve, um, fashion buying experience. This is, uh, what I'm looking for in the near future, 

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Albert: uh, and may some of us be looking forward to what you do with loophole as well. And oh, thank you so much for joining this. Thank you too. Talk today with me, myself, Albert, and Melisa, to, and would you like to, um, shout out your socials so people can find you? 

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Melisa:

Oh yes, of course. Firstly, thank you everyone, and thank you Albert. It was so great to talk with you today. Um, they can connect, uh, with me via LinkedIn.

My LinkedIn is Melisa Cilli, uh, and via Instagram as well. My name is Melisa Cilli and my username is Mada matruska. 

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Albert:

Thank you. Thank you. And if you wanna follow me on social as well, AlbzMadeIt, Instagram AlbzMadeIt you can see more of my art as well. And don't forget to follow us on hundo.xyz on all of our social media platforms that is linkedIn to our Instagram and TikTok as well.

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