Case study · 2026
Custom manufacturing — instant quoting, online ordering
Filament & Form
A print studio that quotes itself, in the browser
A Brisbane 3D printing studio with a live quoting tool at its centre. Upload a model, watch the price move as you tune the spec, and order in minutes. No account, no waiting on an email.
01Brief
Filament & Form print custom parts, prototypes and short runs. Custom manufacturing is quoted the slow way almost everywhere: send us your file, and we'll come back to you. That gap is where jobs go quiet. The brief was to close it. Put a real quote in front of someone while they are still holding the file, without pretending the studio's judgement can be automated away.
Scope
- Brand-led web design
- Instant quote & order configurator
- In-browser 3D model viewer
- Material & finish library
- Photography and render direction
- Performance & SEO foundation
What mattered
- A price reached without waiting
- The file understood before it is quoted
- Studio judgement kept in the loop
02Approach
Quietly, deliberately, in order.
01
We built the quote as the product. A model is read in the browser, and dimensions, volume, surface area and triangle count come back immediately. The part renders in a live 3D viewer, solid or wireframe, so the customer can confirm at a glance that the right file went up.
02
Price is continuous, not a form submission. Material, colour, layer height, infill, finish, quantity, rush and delivery each move the total the moment they change, and the breakdown stays itemised so nothing arrives as a surprise at checkout.
03
Material and finish were treated as content, not a dropdown. Six filaments carry a property profile across strength, heat, durability, detail and flex. Five finishes are shown as a sequence from raw layer lines through to vapour-smoothed, with a drag comparison that runs the CAD model against the printed part.
04
The studio kept its voice on a dark, technical interface. Condensed display type, monospace for anything numeric, and a single accent that only ever marks the next action. Restraint does the work that decoration usually tries to.
Quoting integrity
An honest quote, or none at all.
A live price is only worth having if the studio can stand behind it. The easy version of this tool quotes anything, then corrects the customer later. We built the harder version, where the configurator is candid about what it can and cannot decide on its own.
- Supports, orientation and plate strategy are not customer toggles. They are assessed in the studio, so a file that needs print prep is never quoted as though it prints unsupported.
- Every model is checked against the 256 × 256 × 256 mm build envelope, and anything larger is routed to review for splitting or re-orientation rather than silently accepted.
- STL and 3MF are read directly. Formats that need a human eye are accepted and clearly marked for manual confirmation instead of being guessed at.
- Totals are itemised, GST is shown separately, and each quote carries a seven-day validity so the figure on screen is the figure that holds.
03Selected screens
04Outcome
Trust is the work.
- 01A quote a customer can reach on their own, in minutes, at any hour, without an account or an email thread.
- 02Live geometry read from the file itself, so dimensions and volume feeding the price are the part's own, not a typed estimate.
- 03An itemised total that moves with every spec change, so the number is understood before it is agreed to.
- 04A material and finish library that answers the specification question up front, rather than deferring it to the studio.
What the build sets out to do, in studio terms: fewer enquiries that are really just a request for a price, and more orders that arrive already specified correctly.
Have a service that customers keep having to email you about before they can buy?
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