MAPP Technologies · Made at Whiskey Design · 2021–2022
Back to work ↗The parts can’t be shown. So show what they end up in.
MAPP machines parts for defense programs, and most of that work can’t be shown in public. Its social feed showed the platforms instead, set inside MAPP’s triangle mark: a naval gun, a fighter jet, a space telescope and a Mars rover, each rendered in 3D and paired with one headline.
A shop whose work is invisible.
MAPP Technologies (Mid-America Precision Products) builds to other companies’ drawings: precision machining, fabrication, welding and finishing for defense prime contractors. The parts, the drawings and most of the shop floor can’t be shown.
That leaves a manufacturer with no product shots and a feed to fill. The posts made the programs the content: the ships, aircraft and spacecraft that precision parts end up in, shown at hero scale in MAPP’s colours.
One template, a new platform each time.
Every post is built the same way, so a new post needs only a new platform and a new headline.
- Label and headline. A tracked program label over a serif headline, set in MAPP gold.
- The triangle window. MAPP’s mark becomes a window onto the platform’s world: sea, Mars, space.
- The 3D platform. The hero breaks out of the window, so the frame reads as one object.
- The technical layer. Contour lines, plotted coordinates and gold and orange corners change with each platform.
The programs MAPP builds for.
Two posts carry MAPP’s own programs. MAPP is a manufacturing partner on Phalanx, the Navy’s close-in weapon system, and makes components for the F100 engine that powers the F-15 and F-16.
The F100 piece marked the engine’s fiftieth year: an F-15E swoops in over a dusk sky and settles into the “50”, with 2D type around the 3D jet.
Between programs, the news.
The rest of the feed followed the wider industry: a Hubble discovery, Perseverance’s first long drive on Mars, and the Virginia-class submarine program. These are news posts, not MAPP programs. Each keeps the same window, so the feed reads as one series.
Built to hold up at hero scale.
Each platform started from a licensed model and was resurfaced, lit and animated for the frame, with camera moves timed to the type. Renders kept separate alpha and shadow passes, so one shot could be cut into every format.
The whole series, in one mark.
For MAPP’s own screens, the M itself became the window. The submarine, the rover and Hubble pass behind and through the letter over a slow starfield: a brand loop built entirely from the series’ renders.
“Just doing our part.”
The holiday card swapped hardware for a line of type and a play on the word part. The triangle drops in as the A of HAPPY while 3D snowflakes drift through.
Type animation and 3D snow: the same palette and the same triangle, without the hardware.
Credits
- Client
- MAPP Technologies, L.L.C. (Mid-America Precision Products), Joplin, Missouri
- Agency
- Whiskey Design
- 3D and motion
- Mason Barry, made at Whiskey Design: look development, lighting and animation in Cinema 4D and Redshift; type animation, compositing and format cuts in After Effects; the screensaver
- 3D models
- Platform base models licensed from third-party libraries, then resurfaced, lit and animated
- Deliverables
- Social films (feed 2000 × 1112, 4:3, square), F100 anniversary spot, holiday card, screensaver
- Years
- 2021–2022
The Hubble, Perseverance and Virginia-class posts reported industry news and don’t imply MAPP work on those programs. Phalanx and F100 are described from MAPP’s own public posts. The quote in the Virginia-class post is attributed in the film as delivered.