2017–2020
Application to Master in Design Studies (Mediums Domain) at Harvard Graduate School of Design
Digital, Physical Drawing Writing Render Image Model Video
Architecture Animation Filmmaking Photography Photogrammetry Mixed-Reality Robotics
Xin LIU
Architecture Speculative Architecture, 2019
02—Augmented Library Aggregation Speculative Architecture, 2018
Make-Believe Trilogy
12—Coexist
16—Curiosities
22—Engagement DTLA Experimental Art Film, 2020
28—All At Onceness Interior Architecture, 2020
38—Painted Room Interactive Architecture, 2020
Phygital Supermarket Trilogy
42—Three Supermarkets
46—Phygital Shopping Cart
50—Phygital Supermarket Worlds Commissioned & Office Work Music Video, 2020
54—Burberry Monogram World 3D Animation, 2019
55—Peugeot Automation Factory
Media Art & Design VR, 2019
56—Long Day’s Journey into Night VR Video Art, 2017
57—Liverpool Waterfront Moments Photography Series, 2018-2019
58—Ordos: Cities and Deserts Architectural Game, 2019
59—Become the Internet Technical R&D 2017
60—Procedural Drawing Shader 2020
61—SCI-Arc Virtual Robot House
Manifesto
Stay curious. Stay humble.
Xin Liu is a designer and director who works between architecture and time-based media. His practice centers around the influence of digital and physical on shifting the boundaries of the design of spaces and objects. He is currently freelancing and running the studio BIGFLATNOW. His collaborators include Burberry, Wallpaper, NYLON, and Microsoft. He holds a Master of Architecture degree from Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) where he also worked as the teaching assistant for graduate and undergraduate courses; as well as a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture with Honors degree from the University of Liverpool where his graduation project was awarded the Sheppard Robson Jicwood Prize. Previously, he has worked at Testa & Weiser in the U.S., Sheppard Robson in the U.K., and Tianhua in China. He is traveling around the world examining the notion of both natural and built environments, individual experiences, and emerging techniques. Recognition 2020 - Winner, CGarchitect 3D Awards (Student Film) - “Phygital Shopping Cart” 2020 - Exhibitor, Creative Code Art Festival, NYC - “Three Supermarkets” 2020 - SCI-Arc Graduate Thesis Scholarship 2019 - Exhibitor, Lianzhou Foto Festival - “Liverpool Waterfront Moments” 2019 - Exhibitor, Infinity Festival Hollywood - “Augmented Library Aggregation” 2019 - SCI-Arc Continuing Student Scholarship 2019 - Nominee, CGarchitect 3D Awards (Student Film) - “Augmented Library Aggregation” 2018 - Ten Selected Awards, Hsinta Ecological Power Plant Conceptual Design Competition 2017 - Winner, Sheppard Robson Jicwood Prize - “#IMadeLiverpool”
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01. Architecture / Speculative Film
Augmented Library Aggregation Mixed-Realities and Architectural Interfaces
Academic Work Spring 2019
Role Designer, Director, Film Production In Collaboration with Nero He
Recognition 2019 - Nominee, CGarchitect 3D Awards (Student Film) 2019 - Exhibitor, Infinity Festival Hollywood Video Link vimeo.com/331634391
Advisor Damjan Jovanovic
What if architects are designing multiple layers of realities instead of only the physical space? Library as Information - Multi-layers of Realities As Robert Venturi mentioned, architecture is a communicative medium. Our design, the augmented library aggregation is a cloud of information contains multi-layers of realities. As we shift from the virtual/real dichotomy into augmented space, the physical manifestation of the architecture or city becomes only one of many parallel realities. Our occupation of space no longer matches its built form. We need to be progressive in the design of man-made structures with the understanding that the built environment is just one among many layered realities. In this library, there are three layers of realities: the first layer, solid structures, which provides tangible interface; the second layer, ambiguous objects bashing, which influences the spatial configuration; the third layer, virtual holographic, which is directly representing information. All these layers have interactions with people, by either tangible or intangible ways. Therefore, in this project, the notion of the fixed ideal space is replaced by a temporal, dynamic and interactive construction of reality.
Volume Bashing as Formal Devices
project. Each program within is a world of itself made by the bashing of objects sourced from the various catalogs. This chaotic bashing process is able to create unlimited formal features which are dynamically changing, resulting in endless spaces without directions, without boundaries. This library aggregation contains the very old to the up to date version of itself. Scalefulness Volume bashing operation also results in scalefulness. In large scale, objects become the architectural space containing human activities; in middle scale, objects are acting like furniture; and in small scale, they become pixels in order to locally generating aggregations. Organization We speculate the future library would be a collective of science and humanity. The user group can be divided into humans and machines. Only interfacial machines would have been seen by humans and engineers, interfacial humans, who can manipulate interfacial machines to make the adjustment and upgrade for all machinery systems. Programs varied from a temple with monks to stimulation studios with holograms which contain all library types from the origin to the possible future. The collision between old and new enhance the heterotopia identity of the library.
Endless Greg Lynn mentioned: “Architectural form is conventionally conceived in a dimensional space of idealized stasis, defined by fixed point coordinates” which we could easily discover by opening up any of the mainstream architectural software. However, as a new way of design, volume bashing is the formal device for this
Monolithic Building in Context 2
AUGMENTED LIBRARY AGGREGATION
Royal Library by Claude Nicholas Ledoux
Forms of Knowledge
Catalogue of Objects 4
Form is Content Sourced from Daily Objects
XIN LIU
High Density Aggregation of Objects as a Formal Device 5
AUGMENTED LIBRARY AGGREGATION
Library
Event
Data Center Reading Rooms
Forum / Stage Cinema / Auditorium
Gallery
Future Experience
Exhibition Hall Botanical Garden
XR Platform Immersive Theater
Office
Leisure
Admin / Rental Office Meeting Room
Cafe / Bar Roof Balcony
Circulation Elements Places
Institute
Maintenance
Research Spaces Reading Room
Engineering Room Control Room
Programmatic Organization 6
Circulation
XIN LIU
Solid Structure
Objects Bashing
Holographic
Tangible Interface Physical Reality
Ambiguous Interface Spatial Configurations
Virtual Interface Presentation of Information
Objects Bashing Objects Bashing
Configuration Effector - Scale Objects Bashing
Scale objects down
Configuration Effector - Scale Scale objects along the normal direction of the solid structure surface
Configuration Effector - Rotation Rotate objects from one direction to opposite direction
Three Layers of Realities Creating Different Spatial Interfaces 7
AUGMENTED LIBRARY AGGREGATION
Plan I
Plan II
Reading Data Center
Gallery
Axonometric Section I Architectural Drawings Including All Layers of Realities 8
Section II
XIN LIU
Augmented Physical Model - The Original Status The model is mainly 3D printed with PLA material.
Augmented Physical Model - The Augmented Status The surface of the model is painted with UV ink to create augmentation effect under ultraviolet light. 9
AUGMENTED LIBRARY AGGREGATION
Reading Rooms
Data Center
Gallery 10
XIN LIU
Forum
XR Platform
Cinema and Auditorium 11
02. AR Architecture / Animation
Coexist Academic Work Fall 2018
Role Designer, Animation Production
Recognition 2018 - Exhibitor, Ctrl+Z Motion Design Party
In Collaboration With Manying Wang
Video Link vimeo.com/301813603
Advisor Angelica Lorenzi Natasha Sandmeier
Urban-scale personalized augemented spaces. We were asked to use a “hole” to X-ray architecture. But what is a “hole”? In our opinion, the “hole” is not subtraction, but connection; the “hole” is not demolition, but creation; the “hole” is not empty, but occupying. Our site is Walt Disney Concert Hall, only those people who have tickets can enter it and enjoy the music. The function of the concert hall is separated from the public, especially those people who are walking around the building. So we want to transform the facades into a couple of hole stages to make the building as a performer for the public in the world of augmented reality. Coexist of Real and Virtual World
Coexist of Spatially Overlapped Holes on in AR We want to experiment with spatial forms primarily in the AR world. So we made our hole stages base on the form of original facade and created deception on it. For instance, different hole stages and objects occupy the same position; same drum kit with different appearances; same instruments in overlapped different holes. That’s the second meaning of the title - coexist. Coexist aims to turn Walt Disney Concert Hall into a series of “Hole” stages in the world of AR to connect its function performance to the public. These stages are created by extruding, elongating and hollowing the original organic facade surfaces with music instruments dancing in them. Therefore, the fictional world and the real world, as well as adjacent stages overlap with each other which are two layers of meaning of the title COEXIST.
The form of the building is a series of organic surfaces. Every piece of the façade is a stage which can be used to show the performance. As the music plays on, the façades of the building will be extruded, elongated, hollowed and stages appear. The instruments and activities will fly out of the building creating connections between inside and outside. People with mobile devices can enjoy the same performance in their personal aligned perspectives. Therefore, the fictional world and the real world overlapped with each other, this is the first meaning of the title coexist.
Real vs. Virtual 12
COEXIST
VIOLIN VINYL
FRENCH HORN DAFT PUNK
TRUMPET GUITAR
CELLO
Coexistence of Real and Virtual World
PHONOGRAPH BASS
PIANO
SPEAKERS
Every piece of the façade is a stage which can be used to show the performance. As the music plays on, the façades of the building will be extruded, elongated, hollowed and stages appear. The instruments and activities will fly out of the building creating connections between inside and outside. There are various hole stages for the visualization of different musical instruments. Instruments become the performers performing in the hole stages. Users can see either personalized or shared performances.
Coexistence of Overlapping Holes Disney Concert Hall’s covex volumes are transformed to concave holes. Hole stages are created based on the form of original facade. Visual deception of spatial coexistence is created by having distinctive contents in holes which occupy same space. For instance, different hole stages and objects occupy the same position; same drum kit have different appearances across different holes; same instruments can be seen in overlapped different holes.
Multi-pass Compositing Layers 4. Object Outline - light effects 3. Object ID - hole masks 2. Hole Render Images - foreground 1. Building Render Image - background 14
XIN LIU
Exhibition at SCI-Arc
Animation Frames From real world to virtual world and vice versa. 15
03. Architecture / Photogrammetry
Curiosities Sampling and Recreating Academic Work Fall 2018
Role Designer In Collaboration With Manying Wang
Tools and Techniques Photogrammetry ZBrush 3D Printing Spray Painting
Advisor Marcelyn Gow Florencia Pita
Customized workflow coupling unrelated physical and digital techniques creating new formal expressions. We started by thinking of what is the originality of a work of architecture? What is the relationship between context and building, function and form, space and vvv? In this design, we took the buildings from DTLA as sources to create a new design. The form of the design can be divided into solid and frame part. The frames are mainly acting as circulation cores. Regarding the solids, there are two layers of information: photogrammetry facade from DTLA and surface colors. First, we investigated and scanned building facades as assets of the new design. The reason why we did this is that we want to bring feelings and experiences and recombine them at a new place, in a new way, with new functions to create a new story. To blur the original form and identity, these photogrammetry facades are cut, deconstructed, reconstructed, and masked with offset outlines of the original buildings, creating some interesting moments. For example, this staircase, which came from a park is new combined with the facade of the Broad Museum. People sitting here will have a direct view of the downtown, even its original building the Broad Museum. For example here, two arches on the different axis are aligned with each other.
by different means, giving people a journey-like experience to explore it with their memories of DTLA. These surface features, both formal and color, are not only exterior appearances but also part of the interiority. Take the example of this plan, the negative surface of this facade from a syncretism work of architecture became an indoor climbing wall. It allows people to have body contact and a closer view of the architectural features which they can’t reach if it is the original building. Regarding the of the blocks, they are organized not by merely stacking but intersecting, which also contributes to the blurring of the original identity and the making of new integrity. In summary, whether it is the deconstruction of the original building or the re-application of new materials, the building itself becomes more and more difficult to distinguish. What is new? What is old? What is coping? What is creation? What is the facade and what is space? Let’s find the new possibilities of creating a place in its ambiguity.
The surface color is partially related to the functions. These two complementary color sets represent two types of functions: one is open to the publivc while another is dedicated to private users such as hotel guests or people working here. These analog color gradients look similar but are slightly different. They are assigned across different blocks to blur the identity of the original facades. Therefore, the building can be read at various levels of details and
The Tower 16
CURIOSITIES
01. Photograpmatry of Facades in DTLA
03. 3D Printing
02. Digital Model
04. Spray Painting Palette
Workflow From physical to digital, then to physical. 18
XIN LIU
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CURIOSITIES
Spray Painting of Single Model Unit with Masks
Model Details 20
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04. Architecture / Code
Engagement DTLA Discrete Architecture with Animated Textures Academic Work Fall 2018
Role Designer In Collaboration With Manying Wang Advisor M. Casey Rehm
Tools and Techniques Processing Photogrammetry Cinema 4D Video Link vimeo.com/307822788
Future designers invent new tools or write custom scripts for innovative design. This project is a high-density LED housing for young artists in DTLA which acting as an interface between the city and individuals. It is located in a narrow gap between the Broad Museum and a residential apartment, the Emerson LA. Currently, there is a small plaza. Because of the rising rents and the commercialization of artwork, it is increasingly difficult for young artists to live and work in downtown LA. They have to live far away from where the rent will be cheaper. Only artworks by famous artists can be shown in downtown LA such as the Broad Museum. So we designed a highdensity housing system with a dynamic LED façade.
building can be self-grown from a single unit and can adapt to limitless possibilities in the future. The dynamic textures are created by manipulating the building façade from context. Each texture is controlled by three layers of information: diffuse color, reflectivity, and bump strength. They are projected to the building in the same direction as the façade of the source building. So the continuity is created across different building parts. In summary, this project provides a bottom-up system partially created by artists for artists, and partially created from the city for the city.
High-density modular housing units allow buildings to be produced and assembled faster and cheaper. This will greatly reduce the rent and attract more young artists. The LED facade is a dynamic interface that not only shapes the interior spaces but also displays young artists’ work for the public. It redefines the relationship between architecture and city, the limitation of interior and exterior spaces, the boundary of publicity and privacy, as well as the connection of daily life and public display. While there are no artworks on the LED façade, the dynamic texture becomes a manipulation of the context, which allows the building to successfully disguise in the urban environment. At the same time, it neither conflict nor harmony with the context. The component is created by rotating three same units along the XYZ axis, which means the geometry is completely symmetrical. They can be connected with each other no matter the directions. They can form different spatial compositions to fulfill different functions by rotating and moving. Such a mechanism ensures a
Interior View 22
XIN LIU
ENGAGEMENT DTLA
Geometry of a Single Unit
color
reflection
color
bump
The Emerson LA - North Facade
reflection
color
bump
The Broad - East Facade
reflection
The Broad - South Facade
Manipulation of Contextual Facade Images with Customized Processing Script 24
bump
XIN LIU
Manipulated Textures Applied to XYZ sides of the Unit
Orthographic Views
Meta-Units 25
ENGAGEMENT DTLA
High-Density Modular Housing As the dynamic texture becomes a manipulation of the context, the building is able to successfully disguise in the urban environment. At the same time, it neither conflict nor harmony with the context.
Continuity Across Units in Different Directions 26
XIN LIU
ALL AT ONCENESS
05. Experimental Art Films
All At Onceness Novel Representation of Architecture and Objects
Academic Work Spring 2020
Role Designer, Director, Film Production In Collaboration With Jessie Pan, Leo Wan
Tools and Techniques Cinema 4D Rhinoceros Virtual Robot House
Advisor Devyn Weiser
Phygital substances and materialities blurring the boundary of digital and physical. By tweaking the way an object is represented and viewed, the reading and interpretation of the object can be shifted or changed. In this project, we curated twelve architecture formal assets from Florence, Italy as source. Then these objects are reinterpreted in various novel ways to explore the potential of architectural form via four experimental art films. This project includes One Assets Kit and Four Experimental Art Films: . Formal Possibilities . Phygital Models . Endless Section . Worlds In Worlds
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XIN LIU
Curated Assets There are 12 curated architecture formal assets from Florence, Italy. 29
ALL AT ONCENESS
Experimental Art Film I
Formal Possibilities Various Ways to Bring 2D Drawings to 3D Objects
Step 01. 3D Object to 2D Drawing
Step 02. 2D Compositional Drawing on a 4x3 Grid 30
Video Link vimeo.com/400055363
XIN LIU 01. The model is directly extruded from the canvas to certain heights based on the original color. From bottom to top, they are purple, green, blue and orange. It has the highest resolution so all details, such as thin lines and hatches are extruded. 02/03. Two types of digital filters, pixelation, and blur, are added respectively, resulting in different tweening effects between views and tiles.
04. Some surfaces with different colors are moving up deliberately and transparent blocks are extruding following them. In the end, the camera moves up and the 2d composition reveals. 05. The object touches the canvas. The camera moves around it and ends on the top view, resulting in an anamorphic optical illusion. View matches. 06. The original graphics are extruded and obliquely inserted. From the top view, it creates a new composition with offset graphics.
01. Extrusion Tweening - Hi-Res
02. Extrusion Tweening - Pixelated
03. Extrusion Tweening - Soft
04. Extrusion of Visible Surfaces
05. Match View
06. Offset View
Step 03. Formal Possibilities to Bring 2D Drawings to 3D Objects 31
ALL AT ONCENESS
Experimental Art Film II
Phygital Models
Video Link vimeo.com/410502283
Models Between Physical and Digital.
Plastic Model Digital Rendering
Phygital Materiality Blu
Four Models All At Onceness
Digital Shooting in the Virtual Robot House
Composition of Four Mo
Four phygital models are comb 32
XIN LIU
Tweening Model
3D Print Model
Flat Model
Digital Rendering
Digital Rendering
Digital Rendering
urring the boundary of digital and physical
Flat Model Digital Rendering
odels at Once
bined together, creating a visually aligned, yet non-correlational phygital model which is impossible in the physical world. 33
ALL AT ONCENESS
Experimental Art Film III
Endless Section Architecture, Sliced.
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Video Link vimeo.com/410504248
XIN LIU
Endless Section is a sectional viewing device. While the camera is moving forward, each time it cuts to four very different model parts, but the section keeps the same color, creating a homogeneous sectional silhouette from heterogeneous parts. With such a simple combination of motional tiles and camera, almost countless sectional drawings can be produced.
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ALL AT ONCENESS
Experimental Art Film IV
Video Link vimeo.com/410502967
Worlds In Worlds From Objects to Architecture. From One World to Another.
World Level 0 / SCI-Arc Robot House
World Level 1 / Patio 36
World Level 3 / SCI-Arc Robot House II
World Level 2 / Fictional Flore
ence City
XIN LIU
Worlds In Worlds is a fairy tale speculating on the notion of nesting worlds based on the same model sources in various configurations.
World Level -1 / Isometric World
World Level -2 / SCI-Arc Robot House III
World Level -1 / Isometric World
World Level -2 / SCI-Arc Robot House III
World Level -2 / SCI-Arc Robot House III 37
07. Architecture / Interior Design
Video Link vimeo.com/408355021
Painted Room Digital/Analog Workflow Creating Ornament with Painting and Fabric Techniques
Academic Work Spring 2020
Role Designer, Director In Collaboration With Yuting Zhu
Tools and Techniques Acrylic Paints Cinema 4D Redshift Renderer
Advisor Florencia Pita
Renaissance of traditional analog painting in the post-digital age. Painted Room explores the transformation process from analog painting to digital painting and how it can change the reading and affect the design of spaces and objects. At first, We explored color combinations and stroke shapes with acrylic and other traditional analog paints in the physical world. Then the brush strokes were photographed as digital image samples. Next, we used computer render engined to reproduce and manipulate the texture of the original brush strokes in the digital world. These digital brush strokes were assigned to a baroque style room and furniture to imagine a room made up of paint strokes. For the 3d animation, the background canvas is 2D but the foreground is 3D, producing a dynamic painting illusion. During this process, the original information carried on the analog paint stokes has been shifted, challenging the traditional dualistic relationship between analog and digital.
Room Interior 38
XIN LIU
PAINTED ROOM
Brush Strokes Study with Analog Arcrylic Paints
Procedural Shader to Bring a Photo to a 3D Brush Stroke 40
Photographic Sample of Brush Strokes
XIN LIU
Collection of Digitally and Spatially Painted Furniture 41
08. Phygital Supermarket Trilogy I
Three Supermarkets Hybrid Compositings of Emerging Physical and Digital Mediums and Techniques
Academic Work Fall 2019
Role Designer, Director In Collaboration With Jui-Cheng Hung Fateme Jalali Yuting Zhu
Tools and Techniques Volumetric Video Photogrammetry Robot Arm Motion Control Greenscreen Shooting Cinema 4D Redshift Renderer
Advisor Peter Testa
Recognition 2020 - Exhibitor, Creative Code Art Festival, New York City
The world’s first virtual space design that combines robotic cinematography and volumetric video. Three Supermarkets is an infinite loop film with a shopping cart riding across multiple coexisting fictional supermarkets. As the first episode of the Phygital Supermarket Trilogy, this film explores the hybrid compositing of the emerging physical and digital mediums and techniques. The production process of the design and the film uses industrial-grade six-axis Staubli robot arm as shooting equipment, green screen shooting, volumetric video capture, photogrammetry, Cinema 4D Mograph, Redshift shading & rendering, 2D/3D compositing, and other custom build techniques and workflows. Familiar but neglected objects, such as apples and snack bags, were scanned as either static models or animated model sequences from the physical world to the digital space. Then their scale, form, and look were manipulated with digital techniques to compose three interlocking “supermarket” scenarios with different visual styles, which are running endlessly.
Coexistence of Three Worlds across the Portal Doors 42
THREE SUPERMARKETS
Polygonal Model of the Store Shelf
Abstract Wireframes from Volumetric Captures
Hand-Craft Polygonal Model
Photogrammetry of a Snack Bag
3D Scanned Snack Bag with Stone-Like Materials
Dynamic Glass Surfaces from Volumetric Video
2D Greenscreen Video of a Snack Bag
Layered 2D Greenscreen Videos
Polygonal Model of the Store Shelf
Assests Created with Multiple Mediums and Techniques 44
XIN LIU
Customized Volumetric Video Capturing Setup at Robot House
Greenscreen Shooting Studio at Robot House
Exhibition at SCI-Arc 45
09. Phygital Supermarket Trilogy II
Phygital Shopping Cart Miniature Scenarios in a Shopping Cart
Graduate Thesis Summer 2020
Role Designer, Director In Collaboration With Yuting Zhu Advisor Thesis: Peter Testa, Devyn Weiser Theory: Marrikka Trotter
Tools and Techniques Cinema 4D After Effects Recognition 2020 - Winner, CGarchitect 3D Awards (Student Film) 2020 - Bronze Medal, Momentor Styleframes II Video Link vimeo.com/436558535
Miniature architecture scenarios made of familiar and trivial everyday objects. Phygital Shopping Cart is the second episode of the Phygital Supermarket Trilogy. The main character of the story is a shopping cart (or a trolley). In a shopping cart in a supermarket, we designed six miniature model scenarios, which can be organically combined in a shopping cart. Each miniature scene contains a miniature version shopping cart to tell a short story, and each scene embodies a technology or design method which we explored with Cinema 4D and Redshift Renderer. We selected the most familiar, unremarkable, and most overlooked object in life (that is, common daily necessities in supermarkets), and explored these familiar objects through a unique workflow we developed with Cinema 4D and Redshift rendering technology. Things were explored on the playful side, either enlarge the size or manipulate it with Effectors in order to take a look at what magical effects will burst out. Therefore, in each mini-model scene, in addition to the narrative of the story, a technique is also expressed. As title sequence is used as the format of this film, we use the text on the screen to introduce the story and design techniques of each scene. The Shopping Cart 46
PHYGITAL SHOPPING CART
Farm - Boolean In a farm covered with LEGO blocks, apples are bitten off by blueberries.
3D Cinema - Displacement The iPhone becomes a mini theater. Video and flying texts on the screen are extruded out based on moving displacement maps.
Playground - Painting Brush Strokes Floating painting brush strokes are smeared into various slope ramps to create a playground for small shopping carts. 48
XIN LIU
Cafe - Voronoi Fracturing Lay’s potato chips bag becomes a building, where the inside is a cafe, and the big potato chips become a table for mini shopping carts.
Disorder Shelves - Mograph Cloner The shelves in the miniature supermarket are disrupted by a mini shopping cart!
Mixed Realities - Multipass Rendering Differnt realities can be percepted by differnt visual sensory systems such as human and bird 49
10. Phygital Supermarket Trilogy III
Phygital Supermarket Worlds Interactive Architecture
Graduate Thesis Summer 2020
Role Designer, Director In Collaboration With Yuting Zhu Advisor Thesis: Peter Testa, Devyn Weiser Theory: Marrikka Trotter
Tools and Techniques Cinema 4D Rigid Body Simulation Soft Body Simulation Video Link vimeo.com/455380249
Responsive architectural forms as spatial interfaces. By merging digital techniques and physical objects in playful and unexpected ways, Phygital Supermarket Worlds explores the possibilities of interactive architectural form at the age of post-digital and challenges the legibility and representation of everyday objects. The convergence of digital and physical occurs in both geometrical and textural levels, as well as, in the architectural levels, and cinematic levels throughout the representation of the project. An object is able to be digitally “animated” while keeping the illusion of tactility. The same kit of object assets taken from the supermarket are re-combined, re-represented, and reinterpreted in different ways to compose five distinct worlds — Snack Bar, Farm, Warehouse, Food Store, and Cafe — around the supermarket ecology. Phygital Supermarket Worlds defamiliarizes our relationship with everyday stuff and disintegrates objects and their representation in novel ways.
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I - Elevator Frame Structure
II - Dynamic Void Space
Voronoi Fracturing / The frame structure transforms following the position movement of the elevator.
Boolean Substraction
III - Responsive Table Boolean Intersection / The shape and position of the table follows the movement of objects or characters.
IV - Motion Package Graphics
V - Adaptive Shelves and Storage Units
Video Texture / The package design is an animated media rather than a static picture.
Recursive Subdivision
Speculative Prototypes of Interactive Architectural Interface 51
SNACK BAR
FARM
WAREH
FIVE DISTINCT WORLDS
Motion Package Text
Manufactured Landscape
Fluid Simulation Form
Elevator Structu
Motion Paper Textures
Section
Section
Section
Responsive Thick-Thin Frame
HOUSE
FOOD STORE
CAFE
Adaptive Storage Unit
Dynamic Void Space Based on Characters’ Position
Anti-Gravity Force
ure
Section
Section
FIVE DISTINCT WORLDS
Dynamic Boolean Substraction
COMMISSIONED & OFFICE WORK
11. Music Video
Burberry Monogram World Poolside Party Where Fashion Meshes with Music, Art, and Technology Commisioned Work 2020
Role Director, Designer, Production
In Collaboration with Burberry, Nylon China
Video Link vimeo.com/453484035
Credit Director: Liu Xin Presenter: Xuan FENG / Li Baojian Producer: Cai Xiaoli Executive Director: Deng ss Executive Producer: Mo Mo Cinematographer: Cai Fengyu Gaffer: Wu Xiaogang Set Design: Liu Xin / Zhu Yuting 3D Animation: Liu Xin / Zhu Yuting Matchmoving / Roto / Compositing: Zhu Yuting Colorist: Philips Shum Singer: Victor Ma / AI Hechang Composer: Victor Ma / Kevin Shin / AI Xiaoice Lyricist: Victor Ma / AI Xiaoice Arranger: Kevin Shin
Architectural Interpretation of Burberry’s New Monogram Burberry’s new monogram designed by the famed Manchester art director and graphic designer Peter Saville is reinterpretated architecturally across different scales from large buidings and swimming pools to small suface materials.
Behind The Scenes
Greenscreen Shooting in Shanghai
Virtual Dancers with Motion Capture Data
Architecture as branding content. 54
Motion Tracking & Compositing
XIN LIU
12. Architectural Design / 3D Animation
Peugeot Automation Factory Visualizing the Future Architecture for Automated Assembly Pipeline Office Work Summer and Fall 2019
Role Director
Supervised by Peter Testa, Devyn Weiser
Factory Pipeline
X-Ray of Gyropods 55
MEDIA ART & DESIGN
13. VR Film Set Design
Long Day’s Journey into Night VR A 2000s Dreamy Outdoor Karaoke Courtyard Scene in Southern China Rural Area Academic Work Fall 2019
Role Lead Designer
In Collaboration with Amparito Martinez Kidus Hailesilassie Zihan Gao Richard Cottrell
Advisor Alexey Marfin
A Rural Courtyard In South China In Around 1998 To 2003. It’s cold and foggy from the outside. There are warm lamps at the center. Colorful neon lights makes the scene psychedelic and dreamy. An outdoor Karaoke with Eurodance music. It features the song Paisley Galaxy by Kelly Chen. 56
Youtube VR Link www.youtube.com/watch?v=Im90BziK1OY
XIN LIU
14. Video Art
Liverpool Waterfront Moments Video Collage of Urban Spaces Personal Project 2017
Role Artist
Medium Single channel video, 3 min
Recognition 2019 - Exhibitor, Lianzhou Foto Festival Video Link vimeo.com/204711420
Through the form of video collage, the waterfront in Liverpool, England are deconstructed and reconstructed in 2D motion images. This process not only, to a certain extent, corresponds to the original geological spatial relationship but also involves juxtaposition and misreading. In addition to collage, time is also introduced, so that viewers have a perception of the content and intensity of the activities happened at different locations in the waterfront area, in real time. 57
MEDIA ART & DESIGN
15. Photography Series
Ordos: Cities and Deserts A Visual Essay on a China’s “Stillborn” City after a Decade Personal Project 2018-2019
Role Artist
Recognition 2019 - Featured in Underscore Vol.05 Money
Part I - Cities (Center Plaza, CBD, Government HQ) Urban painting rather than urban planning. Ordos Kangbashi is a new city which was planned and built based on international standards on the barren deserts of China’s Inner Mongolia. It has world-class architecture, international scale stadiums, and brand new housing. However, this new city soon gained negative reputations as a representative of such as ghost town, or stillborn city. The earliest reports about Ordos Kangbashi may be two stories by an Al Jazeera reporter and a Time Magazine photographer respectively in 2009. After then, this new city soon became a shining example of phenomenons in China such as housing bubbles, bankrupt developers, and local government staff artificially boosting GDP in order to get promoted. Most of the coverage is regarding its lack of people living in the new city; the planning of the city center which is not for human scale; as well as deceptive tricks while operating the city such as commercial office buildings whose facade which have lighting effects are completed resulting vibrant impressions on evening from a distance while its interior is merely brutal structure. At that time, the Ordos 100 project lead by Ai Weiwei and one hundred international architects was also at the center of public opinion. It was supposed to build one hundred different houses, but finally, only five building structures are at the deserts as a result of the negative economic situation of the developer, which was a local water treatment company. After a decade since the first report that called it a modern ghost town, and since the beginning of the Ordos 100 project, I visited the city for a few days and noticed a hybrid and contradictory situation not as pointed out by previous reports as a typical dead city. There is a substantial population there, as well as a considerable number of daily tourists who were visiting public buildings such as the Ordos Museum by MAD. At the same time, numerous area in the city looked “perfect” but had a little number of people in the “image.” The city is more like an urban painting rather than urban planning. The facilities and infrastructures, even the amusement park rides looked brand-new, but they were randomly scattered because nobody was managing or operating them. The CBD area, where weeds have grown from the seams of plaza tiles, and skyscrapers only have facade completed, had an office of a Chinese bank which was operating. The reasons, economically, politically or culturally, behind these situations are complex. This photograph series is as a documentary of the phenomenal after a decade as an update. It consists of two parts: Cities, which focuses on the “urban painting” and city life; and Deserts, which focuses on the topic “architecture without context” through examining of Ordos 100 project.
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Part II - Deserts (The Ordos 100 Project by Aiweiwei and Other Architects) Architecture without context.
XIN LIU
16. Architectural Game
Become the Internet Collecting, Sampling and Mashing Academic Work Spring 2019
Role Designer
Individual Work
Advisor Damjan Jovanovic Angelica Lorenzi
Tools and Techniques Unity 3D Platform Sandbox
This project utilizes customized game-like software to “play” with endless reconfigurations of model assets downloaded from internet, and produce enormous amount of architectural accumulations. All material (images and videos) comes directly from the software, as raw, unfiltered expression.
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TECHNICAL R&D
17. Research & Development
Procedural Drawing Shader Personal Project 2017
Role Creator
Tools and Techniques Cinema 4D
All of these illustrations and diagrams are rendered directly from Cinema 4D.
Procedural Drawing Shader is a series of shader presets to quickly generate architectural illustrations and diagrams from any 3D models. It is based on Cinema 4D’s material and rendering system and have a customized intuitive UI for easy control of the style parameters. It can determine the various lines types such as outline, inner line, normal line, contour, wireframe, and intersection line. The surface colors can be influence by light sources or view angles. As it’s fully procedural, it not only can improves work efficiency, but also generates animated drawings and diagrams. 60
XIN LIU
18. Research & Development
SCI-Arc Virtual Robot House Personal Project 2020
Role Creator
Tools and Techniques Cinema 4D
Since COVID-19 interrupted my plan in the last spring studio, instead of shooting models with physical robot arms, I developed a 1:1 Virtual Robot House with full inverse kinematic controlled Robot Arms in Cinema 4D to mimic the physical operation. In addition to the robot arms, there are also rigged lighting equipments with intuitive UI for users to control the light color, intensity and direction. I shared this Virtual Robot House setup with classmates so they can use it on demand. 61
Copyright © 2020 by Xin Liu
Xin Liu
Designer, Director
www.liuxin.studio liuxinstudio@gmail.com