VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS Student Journals Semseter 2, 2013
Module 2
MODULE 2 DESIGN
ORIGIONAL IDEA
Design 1:
For my personal space, I think my arms can perfectly show it. It is because we always use our arms to protect ourselves. For example, when we feel danger, we might move our arms in front of our bodies to protect our most import part of body. We also move around our arms to create our personal space. Therefore, for the further idea of my second skin, I would like to improve the function of our arms to create a larger personal space or create a stronger message from the second skin.
Another important task is to combine different material systems into our second skin design. From the side view of this second skin sketch, each components will be like the system of section and profile. Each sections of the skin will cover the whole arm. And each of them are sharp and have similar geometry (triangular pyramid). Therefore, it is the panel and fold system.
The original idea of the second skin has designed on my shoulder. In this week, we are trying to combine different material systems into our next generation second skin. Also, in week 4 lecture, we have learnt that the second skin is a protection of our first skin and it is related to our own personal space.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
The interesting part of this second skin design is the movement. As I have mention before, my personal space is demonstrated by the movement of my arms. Also, the second skin will provide a stronger message for my personal space to the people around. In this second skin design, each components will move upward with sharp angle when my arms are moved. Therefore, when I want to protect my first skin of my body, my second skin will give me a larger personal space and strong message. And this design will also be developed by the skin and bones system.
The second skin design will have two layers. The first layer will be just a second skin which will be used to covered the whole arm, then the second layer will be those sharp geometries. Therefore, it will be like a skin and bone system and the string for the skin movement will be hided by the first layer.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Further design 1: With my first idea of the second skin, I was try to create a movement to represent the skin and bone system. However, I have found that it is hard to make it work perfectly and it haven’t has a volume in it. The design was just a 2D horn stick on my skin. Therefore, I developed another design which has a larger volume.
For the skin and bones systems, this time the internal structure will represent the bone system (the support) and we will have a cover placed over the support and it is the skin system.
To create the volume, I will need to make an other layer, I will have the first LOFT with the first layer, then I will LOFT again with the second so it will be able to create the volume rather just a 2D object without a skin and bones material system.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Design with Rhino The main method to design the second skin on Rhino was creating lines and curves, this is to produce the support of the second skin which is the bones system. After that, we can use the LOFT to create the skin for it.
LOFT
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Reflection on the design 1 : The biggest problem of the design is that how those geometry be held together and make it easy to wear on our arms. At the moment, each of the geometries are more like disperse to the others. Maybe we should create a base layer of the second skin so that it can be used to hold the geometries.
Also, there are some Rhino technical problem such as the combination of the skins.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Personal Space
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Design 2:
CREATING A SECOND SKIN Having made a satisfactory panel, I began to experiment with how the panel can be repeated to create a single structure. I tried to consider how the panel could join and express personal space. I focused on the shoulder because I see it as the the body part we use most to express personal space. When we feel our personal space is threatened our shoulders move upwards and inwards. Our arms also cross. I wanted to make use of these almost universal gestures of discomfort. My original idea was static, I just wanted to create an “armour” which accentuates shoulder movements. However, working in a group made me consider making a dynamic design from looking at Michael’s first sketch designs.
EXAGGERATED BODY LANGUAGE If we wanted our design to truly exaggerate body language and as a result articulate the wearer’s ideas of personal space, we needed a design which responds to the wearer’s actual body language. I started to consider how the body moves when you feel your personal space is threatedned and how you could create a defensive structure which responds to these movements. This is why I decided on panels which spread and open when the wearer’s body responds to a threat of personal space by raising their shoulders or folding their arms. The design also exaggerates these actions by imitating them.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Design 2 on Rhino:
A DYNAMIC WING The design is a dynamic wing structure which folds flat and responds to body language in order to create defensive spikes which articulate the wearer’s personal space. This is drawing on the way the body responds when personal space feels invaded: the crossing of arms and upwards movement of shoulders. This draws from natures - think of animals such as a frill-neck lizard or puffer fish.
COMBINED STRUCTURES The design uses both panel and fold and skin and bone structures. The panel and fold system is used to make the individual plates which form the structure. Each plate could be considered a panel OR a skin. The string which is intended to run through the panels to make the design adaptive is the corresponding “bone”.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Precedent: In understanding material system Skin & Bones further, a relevant example and mechanism is the works of Dukno Yoon a fine metal smith and jeweller. Systems created by Yoon integrate an eclectic range of positive elements of which relate to category skin and bones. Previously the topic of personal space was explored and the idea of incorporating movement into designs could potentially be used to avoid a breach of personal space. This is why Yoon appealed to me.
MECHANICAL MOVEMENT His pieces shown below are inspired from nature, focussing more on the movement of birds. Pretty much, they are series of rings which rely on your finger movement to simulate the flapping of a birds wings through a mechanical extension. The whole idea was fragile wings constrained and controlled by a machine becoming a metaphor for how people should perceive nature in modern times.
One of the most important things seen when viewing the ‘Wings’ exhibition was that Yoon demonstrates the important balance between form and function. The pieces all contained a mechanical structure, which requires human interaction to perform kinetic movement in what Yoon describes as ‘the most crucial formal language’. This can be related to our talks on body language. I found that with all his products the dominant and important element is rendered useless without human interaction. It means that if incorporated into our design, the costume becomes more of an extension of the human body and a much more intimate feature rather than an inanimate add-on to the body.
So in this piece it is one of his simplest systems where extension and retraction of the finger worked to push and pull two thin wires, which then caused the two metal rods and their attached feathers to pivot one hundred eighty degrees. So we see a 45 degree finger movement change into a 180 degree wing movement. Additionally the choice of material was smart as the use of thin metal wire gave a more natural characteristics in how it moved because the inconsistent bending of the wires gave a slightly different movement each time. This was depended on how fast or far the user chose to move the finger.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Precedent: INTEGRATION OF SMALLER MOVEMENTS CREATING A LARGER EFFECT In Yoon’s work he dominantly focuses around the movements of the hands, fingers and wrists. Shown before again he shows how the smallest body movements can create and transition into much larger mechanical movement. This is again shown in his mimicking of the larger wings piece.
In this piece the wrist movement is what causes the wings to flap up and down. There are two points of interaction with the user in the design. There is a stainless steel bracelet and when the wrist is flexed slightly , the backside of the hand lifts the lever and raises the wings. When the hand moves back to the original position the wings drops and falls to the previous position. Repetition of this movement is the key to showing the vitality/life in the object and the control over tension and speed.
These previous pictures are the more simple structures which would be e easier to replicate but he does have others which are more complex to give different characteristics.
So in this design he has added an additional fulcrum, which is a point of support and a lever on a the third part of the finger on top of the other lever. This then creates a double movement and the feathers flap slower while the whole object moves up and down.
So I think the main key points we took from his design are, his imitations of natural actions, the effective use of repetition in design, how to give vitality to objects, using everyday forces in our favor such as tension, torque, and thrust and even gravity and how to balance the form of an object with its function .Even though he did not have a practical purpose to it as it was just merely created as art we are able to use some of the structural aspects to help us in adding more complexity to our designs.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
300 words response on readings and lecture
In the week 4 lecture, it has introduced us the concept of design effects. Deign effect means a change of a design which is a result or consequence of an action or other cause. Differentiated effects is changing and repeating the scale or pattern of geometry to create a very different effect of design. Interference effects is using the second layer which has different pattern from the first layer and then combine them together to create the design. Multiple is a way to multiply the geometry or a common object and it will create the effect that make the common object or geometry become more interesting. This lecture told us some simple ways to create our design effects. For my second skin design, those effects could be used. For example, differential effect will be shown by the components of the triangular pyramid geometry, because different part of our arms will have different size (muscle) and the different scale of the geometry components will create the effect. Multiple might be represented by the reparation of the triangular pyramid geometry along the arm. Parameter space introduced us the mathematical of geometry design in architecture. Once the 3D modeling technology developed, architects started working with the 3D mathematic physical modeling. The reading told us the importance of physical modeling, is always an abstraction of reality. Then, it has introduced us the concepts of Meshes and NURBS, they are extremely important for abstracting curves surfaces. Meshes is perfect to represent a curve surface but it is impossible to build in the reality. Therefore, NURBS came out with the mathematical theory which is using control point of geometry to form the curve surface. Physical modeling is also can be used to test our materials use. Reduction is meaning that we should always reduce and simplify the shape of a design. Therefore, we can easily understand the rule and the system of the design. This reading gave us some senses of our prototype model such as using a simple geometry for our designing model and understand the system first rather then go directly to a complex design. Actually, the readings and the lecture are having a similar points of view, they encourage us to use a simple geometry and rule to create a interesting design effect, we shouldn’t think about the design complexity at the beginning.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Prototype design For our prototype, the first thing we have to concern about is the mechanism and the combination of each of the geometry. Therefore, we have got the idea of a FANS, the system within the fans is useful for our prototype, think about when the fan expended, it will need a string to create the tension. Same as our idea of the second skin, we will need a string to connect through each geometry and then when we pull or give a tension to the string, it will pull out each of our geometries. Very simply, the system working within the fan is representing the material system of skin and bones.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Prototype design on Rhino
Because we need to combine those geometries together, so we had created this new panels with our design on Rhino. Those planes are placed here. Now, each of the geometry has a gap so we can place another one on the top nicely. To print it out from the rhino and make the physical model, we will first need to transfer the 3D modeling into a flat and 2D surface. Therefore, we need to unroll it on rhino. As we want to create a gap, we need to create an extra surface here, and then we will use this extra plane to connect the two surface together at the bottom by sticking them.
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Prototype processing and analysing
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Prototype processing and analysing
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Prototype processing and analysing
MODULE 2 DESIGN
Prototype processing and analysing