Articulated Geometry - Material Driven Design

EMERGENT TECHNOLOGIES AND DESIGN, BOOTCAMP 2019 - 2020 Course Director Dr. Elif Erdine Founding Director Dr. Michael Weinstock Studio Tutors Alican Sungur Eleana Polychronaki Abhinav Chaudhary Lorenzo Santelli

GROUP 7 Debolina Ray Devaiah Ponnimada

Emergent Technologies and design | AA School of Architecture

ABSTRACT The motive of this project was to initiate a thought process based on the basic principles of algorithmic thinking and an iterative design process, with the initial constraints being a type of surface and two different material systems. The process of iteration would therefore help us understand methods of testing and prototyping, The surface assigned to us was an articulated surface and the materials assigned were paper and veneer. The project was divided into two phases: In phase 1, we had to develop an articulated surface using paper as our material.The prototypes and material tests were conducted keeping in mind the nature of the material. We explored the properties of paper; its strengths and drawbacks, both individually and as a conglomerate system. Observations from different articulated surfaces existing in nature were also used to generate guidelines based on which we generated our final articulated surface design.

After we progressed with tests on paper, we analysed the failures of kerfing and joinery techniques.

In phase 2, we critically reflected on the failures in phase 1 and further modified our approach to working with veneer. We further developed our local geometry by modifying our module with 3 vertices to a module with 4 vertices thereby changing our regional geometry. This in turn helped us achieve our global geometry.

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Abstract

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Index

INDEX 1. Introduction 2. Computational Logic a. Logic b. Pseudo code c. Prototyping 3. Phase 1 a. Material tests b. Kerfing tests c. Prototype layering tests 4. Phase 2 a. Material tests b. Joinery tests c. Global geometry 5. Conclusion

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INTRODUCTION We started by understanding the meaning of articulated surfaces.

An articulated surface can be defined as a surface comprising of a number of elements joined together. The articulated surface may or may or may not have a seamless joinery system.

Also, we were assigned the final material as Veneer.

The initial goal was to understand the geometry and its implication on paper as a material, which we could carry on keeping in mind our final material. Hence, making a structurally stable and logical sytem was kept in mind from the start.

Our approach was set by observing a few articulated surfaces that already exist in nature and understanding the system on a holistic level.

We began by generating our shape from a gridded structure, then extracting hexagons, further joining the circles along the vertices to achieve our triangular prototype.

Further we researched on layering of materials to achieve an articulated surface.

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Introduction

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Courtesy: Flickr.com

Introduction

White royal butterfly egg

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Computational Logic

LOGIC From our observations based on the various articulated surfaces existing in nature, we tried to sum up a few guidelines based on which our articulated surface would be structured.

Hence, we took into consideration the following points: a. The most commonly found geometry on articulated surfaces. b. Layering techniques and how it affects in naturally existing articulated surfaces in carbon compounds. c. Joinery systems that exist within the structure of articulated surfaces.

Joinery system between components

Component from geometry analysis

Layering

ARTICULATED SURFACE

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Computational Logic

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PSEUDO - CODE

Step 1

Generate a developable surface.

Step 2

Divide the surface into a hexagonal grid and find the vertices.

Step 3

Find the centroid of the hexagons.

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Step 4

Inscribe circles using the centroids.

Step 5

Develop a surface in the region difference between the hexagons and the circles.

Step 6

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Computational Logic

Extrude the vertices with respect to their normals. Amplitude of vector based on physical tests.

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Computational Logic

Creating a double gridded membrane

Step 1

Insertion of hexagons along the grid

Step 2

Populating with hexagons to understand the global relationship

Step 3 8

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Computational Logic

Generation of circles with center points as the vertices of the hexagons

Step 4

Collation of points generated from the center of the circles and generating a relation between ach other.

Step 5

Computational Logic

Step 6

Step 7

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Generating the bounds for our module.

Collation of points generated from the center of the circles and generating a relation between ach other.

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Computational Logic

PROTOTYPING

Module generation sketch

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Phase 1

PHASE 1 Material and kerfing tests Component optimisation using kerfing techniques.

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Offsetting layers for strengthening the weaker joints.

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Phase 1

Phase 1

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Layering the multiple components using joints.

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PHASE 1 Prototyping tests

Observation: 1. Layering improved strength of the regional geometry.

2. No global geometry achieved.

3. Kerfing pattern led to loss of the paper’s strength but at the same time helped ending evenly along all 3 vertices..

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Phase 1

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Phase 2

PHASE 2 Material tests - Veneer

Observation: 1. Veneer bends easily along the grain.

2. Cracks emerge after a point of compression.

3. The bending quality along the grain improves with span.

4. The bending quality against the grain improves with increase in span along the grain.

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Bending techniques to achieve a global geometry

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Phase 2

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Phase 2

PHASE 2 Joinery tests

Images showing the re-orientation of layers by moving the joint holes on the bottom layer inwards to induce curvature into our local geometry.

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Images showing the stiffness, strength and curvature gained by the improved joinery system and kerfing techniques, post phase 1; into our regional geometry.

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Phase 2

Phase 2

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Images showing the state of transient equilibrium the regional geometry achieved after 6 modules were joined to each other. To achieve global geometry, the system was changed to accomodate 5 joints instead of 6.

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Local Geometry

Regional Geometry

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Phase 2

Phase 2

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Global Geometry

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CONCLUSION 1. Transitioning from paper to veneer, demanded the need to modify the geometry of the module in order to achieve desired results.

2. Changing the geometry of the module affected the strength of the overall surface and inturn the global geometry.

3. Having been made aware of alternate methods of generating the vertices of the hexagonal grid, we relooked at the computational logic.

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Conclusion

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