Tyco Electronics, a leading manufacturer of solar energy systems, contracted Richard Bornemann to create an innovative illustration to help market their suite of products as a turnkey green energy solution. Because their products appear behind the scenes for the most part, the illustration would show a typical home with the entire system installed throughout using cutaways to depict components not visible from the exterior.  

The first task was to actually design a home. A trained architect, Bornemann researched typical East Coast residential architecture and created a prototypic design in a 3D digital wireframe view. He then cropped the image to focus on the garage area where the solar system is to be installed.



For the next step materials and colors were added to the home and the windows were given a blue tint and transparency. Bornemann developed a lawn in Photoshop and montaged it into the house image; a stock photo of a sky was selected and the clouds were modified to frame the home. Solar panels were then added to the garage roof.

Detailed landscaping was created, with shadows under the bushes to "anchor" them to the lawn.

For the final step the garage wall was cut away, revealing the Tyco Electronics solar system components installed within. The finished illustration demonstrates exactly how Tyco provides a complete hardware/software solution that brings clean power into the home.