How to Choose a Product CGI Studio.

A name. A person. A body of work you can review. A studio that leads with a Creative Director as a specific individual — not a "team" — is structured for creative accountability. The Creative Director is the person responsible for the visual quality of your work. If they can't name them before the project starts, they probably won't have one.

A structured pre-production stage: storyboard, animatic, material tests, lighting review — all shared with you for approval before a single final frame is rendered. This process protects your budget. Changes at storyboard stage cost nothing. Changes after final render can cost as much as the original production.

A clear, written revision policy. Two rounds is a reasonable standard for most projects. The studio should use a review tool (Frame.io or equivalent) that allows you to annotate directly on the frame rather than describing changes in email. Scope for additional rounds should be quoted clearly before they begin — not added to the final invoice.

Custom material reconstruction from physical reference: studying how your specific material — alloy grade, surface finish, coating process — actually behaves under light, and rebuilding that behaviour in the render engine. This is what separates CGI that looks real from CGI that looks generically metallic or plasticky.

Clear guidance on what file types are accepted (CAD formats, existing 3D models, technical drawings) and a transparent explanation of how the absence of CAD files affects scope and cost. A studio that has worked with complex, pre-manufacture products will have a clear process for extracting the information they need from whatever source material exists.

A detailed case study — not just a finished render — that shows the brief, the creative approach, the production process and the result. Ideally from a product category similar to yours. A studio that can speak fluently about the creative decisions they made on a previous project similar to yours has sector experience that will benefit your brief.

Full asset handover: the complete 3D model, material library, and source files delivered to you alongside the final renders. The 3D asset is one of the most valuable deliverables from a CGI project. You should own it and be able to use it for future content production.

A specific deliverables list: file formats (TIFF, PNG, ProRes, H.264), resolutions, colour space (sRGB for digital, Adobe RGB for print), naming conventions, and whether social format variants are included. Good studios deliver everything simultaneously, in full, with a clear naming convention. They don't stage delivery or hold formats for separate handover.