Human Craftmanship Still Matters

At the beginning of this project, the design agency Hi Shine gave us a clear request: no AI was to be used. Everything had to be done for real, by real people, with real materials, real mistakes and real problem solving. That request didn’t feel like a limitation, instead it felt like an invitation. An invitation to commit fully to the craft, and to let human hands and experience guide our work from start to finish.

Katko is a Finnish company with deep roots in industrial craftsmanship. Katko’s switches and isolators are designed for environments where failure is not an option—factories, ships, wind farms, icy landscapes, and unforgiving heat. What makes Katko special is not only the durability of their products, but how they are made: assembled largely by hand, with care, precision, and responsibility. That philosophy became the backbone of our work.

There is a long tradition of this way of working in filmmaking. Before computer graphics took over, filmmakers built worlds with miniatures and models, smoke and mirrors. Star Wars created entire galaxies with physical sets and scale models. The Lord of the Rings used forced perspective, handcrafted miniatures, and practical effects to make Middle-earth feel alive and believable. Those films still resonate today not because they are perfect, but because they feel human. You can sense the hands behind them. We wanted to humbly stand in that same lineage and to create something that carries our fingerprints and effort.

Working without AI meant trusting people: trusting our own ability to learn and to experiment. To sometimes fail. Every texture, every movement of sand, snow, and water had to be earned. Much like Katko’s products, our work was assembled piece by piece, through group work and shared problem solving. The result is not just images and video, but a reflection of values; reliability and respect for craft.

By far the hardest parts of the process was learning how to create these extreme environments from scratch. For the hot, arid desert world we studied what kind of mixture would look best when thrown into a big fan. And later on realised how the fine grains were found all over the studio weeks after the shoot. For us Finns, the cold, unforgiving snow world was the most difficult. We understood that the effects had to look as realistic as possible, and by experimentation and hard work we maybe achieved something cool. The water element was perhaps the most unpredictable of all, requiring us to work with real water, motion, and instability and accepting the random nature of the process.

Each environment challenged us, but were also an integral part of the shoot. We weren’t just depicting harsh conditions, but instead experiencing them in our own way, one day covered in dust and sand, the next day drenched with water. That shared experience brought the team closer together, forming the same kind of quiet trust that exists on a factory or in a workshop.

In a time when images can be generated instantly, being able to make something with your own hands is inspiring. Stuff made by people, for people. The end results are not just about Katko’s products surviving harsh environment, they are about the belief that human craftsmanship still matters.