USBABY — 3D-printed USB sticks for DJs | AI Creative Direction

Project: USBABY — custom USB sticks for DJs (own concept)
Role: Concept, product design, 3D models, mockups, AI imagery & film
Year: 2026
Tools: Claude, FLORA, Nano Banana Pro, Tripo 3D, Seedance 2.5

The idea

The whole set fits on a stick. So make the stick the artist.

Every DJ carries their night on a USB stick — and it is almost always a cheap rectangle of plastic with a strip of tape on it. USBABY turns that stick into the DJ's own icon: the mask, the helmet or the mascot the crowd knows, printed in resin around a fast USB core.

It is a tool in the booth, a gift for the crew, a collectible for fans and a piece of merch nobody else can sell. It started with a spider.

The first USBABY concept: two black spider-shaped USB sticks lying on a DJ mixer — Where it started — the first spider concept, July 2026

Interactive · 3D

Turn it over in your hand.

Five designs for five artists who already perform behind a face. Pick one, drag to rotate and zoom in on the plug, the layered edges and the finish.

USB stick shaped like a black mouse head with glowing red eyes and a toothy grin

Drag to rotate · scroll or pinch to zoom

01 / 05

MAU5

for deadmau5

Gloss black resin, translucent red eyes and grin. About 6 × 4.5 × 1.2 cm, with a USB-A plug and a USB 3.2 core.

3D models generated from the product renders — the same files a printer would start from.

The collection

Six faces, one plug.

Every design shares the same construction — a layered shell, a USB-A plug on top and a keyring point — so the range stays one family however different the faces are.

Six custom USB sticks standing on a black acrylic plinth: black mouse head with red eyes, white marshmallow face, chrome robot helmet, gold beak mask, white joker mask and black spider — MAU5 · MELLO · HELMET · BEAK · JOKER · SPIDER

White rounded USB stick with black X eyes and a smile — MELLO — for Marshmello

Chrome robot-helmet USB stick with a black visor — HELMET — a Daft Punk tribute

Gold long-beaked mask USB stick with engraved ornament — BEAK — for Claptone

White grinning carnival-mask USB stick with red and black lines — JOKER — for Boris Brejcha

In the booth

Easy to find in the dark.

A booth is dark, crowded and full of identical black sticks. A shape you can find by touch — and that the crowd can see on the decks — is the whole point.

View from behind a club DJ booth over two media players and a mixer: the mouse-head, robot-helmet and marshmallow USB sticks on the decks, a crowd with raised hands and lasers beyond — Peak time — three sticks on the decks

The black mouse-head USB stick with glowing red eyes on a DJ media player under red club light — MAU5 — red eyes in a red room

A hand holding up the white marshmallow USB stick on a black lanyard backstage at a festival — MELLO — backstage, on the lanyard

HELMET — chrome catches every light in the room

Made to order

From icon to stick.

01

Your icon

A mask, a helmet, a logo or a mascot — whatever the crowd recognises from the back of the room.

02

Modelled

The icon becomes a two-part shell around a standard USB flash core, with snap-fit clips and a keyring point.

03

Printed

Resin-printed at 50 µm, sanded, painted by hand and clear-coated. Short runs: one for the artist, a hundred for the crew.

04

Loaded

A USB 3.2 core of 64, 128 or 256 GB, formatted for the booth and pre-loaded with the set before it ships.

Printed — six shells per plate

Exploded view of the marshmallow USB stick: front shell, USB flash circuit board with plug, back shell with clips, a screw and a keyring — Inside — two shells, one flash core, one screw

Packaging

Black box, one face.

A rigid black box with USBABY blind-embossed on the lid and the stick set in cut foam — built to be handed over backstage, or sold at the merch stand next to the vinyl.

Open matte black USBABY gift box with the gold beak-mask USB stick in a black foam insert — BEAK — in the box

Flat lay of the white joker-mask USB stick with DJ headphones, a vinyl record, a notebook and a lanyard — JOKER — the travel kit

Process

Five product renders were made first, from the original spider concept, and used as the reference for every mockup and film so each design stays the same everywhere. The renders were then turned into textured 3D models, optimised for the web and shown with an interactive viewer. Images with Nano Banana Pro, 3D with Tripo, films with Seedance 2.5.

Unofficial, speculative product concept. Not affiliated with, sponsored or endorsed by deadmau5, Marshmello, Daft Punk, Claptone, Boris Brejcha or Marvel. Their names, masks, helmets and emblems are trademarks of their respective owners and are shown only to illustrate the concept. Products and specifications are fictional; no images are photographs.