ALAN CATION ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN // COMPUTATION // 3D PRINTING // ROBOTICS
01
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
SWARMING M.A.T.R.
ACADEMIC: CCA // SP 2015 M.ARCH THESIS ADVISOR: Nataly Getegno // Thom Faulders TEAM: Alan Cation // Clayton Muhleman
Swarming M.A.T.R. (Mobile Autonomous 3D Printing Robotics) investigates both the role of the architect as space-maker in a rapidly changing world that is increasingly reliant on autonomous machines for production, and what constitutes an architecture that is generated by intelligent fabrication tools. When artificial intelligence and deep learning allows for the automated construction of architecture by collaborative construction robots, design becomes dramatically different, and this difference highlights the shifting importance of design in such a process. In a system where agency is delegated to intelligent machines, the design process becomes virtually indistinguishable from the construction technique. This means that design shifts from a drawing oriented methodology to a methodology reliant on simulation and computer programming. The architects become designers of rule-based organizational systems that are carried out by a swarm of machines equipped with local sensors and the capacity to think out the rules given to them by the designer. Swarming M.A.T.R. envisions a robotic future that rethinks the notion of intelligent architectures, and considers a new form of architecture altogether: one where construction tools become creative entities that are a part of the architectural space.
02
ROBOTS // BEHAVIORS The design process is reliant on the development of robots and how they behave to achieve a spatial result from their automated construction methods. Behaviors are the basis for locomotion as well as construction actions, and design decision making. The process begins by identifying and imagining different mobile robotic species that will enact different stages in the construction. Each of these robot types are explicated with an inherent behavior that can be simulated to create a design outcome. Behaviors are then encoded to begin generating design outcomes. Swarm intelligence is the foundation for the robotic movement, and additional construction behaviors are added based on each species’ necessary performance. The output is seen as a set of architectural scenarios that are simulated by an agent-based design algorithm. Each robot in this case is considered an agent that constructs emergent and changing architectural spaces.
ROBOTIC SPECIES
EARTH MOVER
EXCAVATOR
CONSTRUCTION PROCESS // BEHAVIOR PSEUDOCODE
EARTH COMPRESSOR
FLYING PRINTER
EARTH PRINTER 1) Scanning Site
2) Digging Site Material
3) Mounding Site Material for First Layer
4) Printing Layer by Layer
5) Adding More Material & Continuing Printing
6) Excavating Structure After Material Hardens
7) Scanning Structure for Potential Canopies
8) Printing Triangular Canopies Appending Structure
9) Finishing Canopy Print
10) Standing Structure
11) Demolish and Reprocess Sand
12) Level Site for Next Season’s Print
DESTROYER
BASIC SWARM INTELLIGENCE
MORPHOGENETIC CONSTRUCTION SYSTEM The design and construction process are inseparable in the robotic system. At this stage, the robot’s tasks are built into an algorithm that functions on top of the flocking system. Goldfish and Mightymole are cut and fill agent behaviors. As they pass a focal point, they add and remove material, where Mightymole digs and excavates printed structure, and Goldfish mounds material to be printed upon. The Hummingbird behavior acts as a print agent that generates the overall structure. It prints on new mounded material and registers zones where structure has been printed underneath. After an area has sat and cured, the Mightymole behavior works on excavating the buried structure, and re-mounds that material to be printed upon elsewhere on the site. The entire process represents a design ecology that is met with an equivalent amount of cut and fill on the site. Sensors are what allows the robots to make such decisions, and this presents a simulated form of artificial intelligence, utilizing swarm based decision making to enact spatial and design responses on the fly.
3D PRINTED STRUCTURAL ITERATIONS
SITE OVERVIEW // PRINTING SCENARIO
02
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
SWARMSCAPERS
ACADEMIC: CCA // FA 2014 CREATIVE ARCHITECTURE MACHINES STUDIO ADVISOR: Jason Kelly Johnson // Michael Shiloh TEAM: Alan Cation // Clayton Muhleman // A. Satish
Swarmscapers documents research exploring the territory of autonomous on-site fabrication machines in the context of the design and construction of architecture. Swarmscapers contributes to the discourse concerning 3d printed architecture through the development of a mobile robotic 3d printing platform. Swarmscapers proposes an additive fabrication method to print buildings that is deployable at a variety of scales. Throughout the research process, the developed mobile robot successfully executed multiple 3d prints autonomously. Additionally, the exploration of this technique allows projection into what capabilities future autonomous fabrication machines may have. Swarmscapers reconsiders the notion of large-scale 3d printing and demonstrates a first step towards the enterprise of architectural 3d printing with its defined methods. Swarmscapers eliminates the notion of gantry-arm printing by introducing a swarm of mobile autonomous 3d printing robots capable of operating collaboratively in order to carry out the task of 3d printing at a large scale. Rather than sending a single large machine to a site, multiple small machines can behaviorally cooperate to achieve the same task. Utilizing a hybridization of on-and-offsite materials to create inhabitable structures, the robotic swarm’s behavior materializes through a slow and constant process of layered 3d printing.
06
MOBILE ROBOTIC AXON
PRINT TECHNIQUE
1) SCAN SITE
2) TRIANGULATE NETWORK
3) CIRCLE-PACK NETWORK
DIGITAL DESIGN TO PHYSICAL MODEL
03
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
ETHIOPIA PAVILION
ACADEMIC: CCA // SP 2014 INTEGRATED BUILDING DESIGN STUDIO ADVISOR: Mauricio Soto TEAM: Alan Cation // Kelly Hang
Ethiopia Pavilion is a design proposal for the Milan Expo 2015, with the theme: “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life�. In the spirit o the theme, Ethiopia pavilion proposes a housing exhibit for the sustainable agricultural method known as permaculture, which is used in Ethiopia as a means to stifle soil erosion and produce enough food for entire communities to live off of the land. The pavilion design utilizes the exterior space for the exterior portion of the permaculture forest, while the interior encompasses the productive portion of a permaculture forest in a controlled green-house environment. The pavilion takes users through the exterior belt, to a semi-covered bamboo forest, to the interior walk-through and finally to a restaurant utilizing the food produced on-site. The construction technique utilizes a funicular shell that is made from bamboo members, where bamboo is laid flat in a grid and erected into place using cranes to create the structural shell. The skin is a tensile membrane that is wrapped over the structure with custom joints holding it in place. The construction technique is meant to be quick in order for the pavilion to be deployed both at the expo in Milan, and then shipped to Ethiopia to be assembled in the southern region of the country. The structural materials are found locally throughout Ethiopia as well.
10
04
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
CLIFF HANGER
ACADEMIC: SIU // FA 2011 UNDERGRADUATE CORE STUDIO III ADVISOR: Stewart Wessel INDIVIDUAL
Cliff Hanger is a proposal to imagine a house that is built on the face of a cliff. The design and location takes the adventurous nature of the client into consideration, while creating spatial protrusions from the cliff-face. Openings on the south facade are a result of solar analysis , while openings looking northward are for views that blend exterior and interior functions. The house is equipped with an outlook space for reflection, as well as openings that allow the client to scale the edge of the cliff at varying elevations. The main body of the house is comprised of composite triangulated panels that are flat when closed and protrude outward when open. The open panels protrude in differing directions to frame views of the natural environment. Structural columns branch upward from the cliff to stabilize the body of the house. Ornamental patterns are infused into the panels in order to enhance the affect of blurring the boundary between interior and exterior forms.
12
0’
2’
5’
10’
20’
0’
2’
5’
10’
20’
05
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
UTOPIAN GROUNDS ACADEMIC: CCA // FA 2013 CORE STUDIO III - HOUSING ADVISOR: Neal Schwartz INDIVIDUAL
San Francisco has been historically known as a haven for its thriving LGBTQ+ community, whose documented beginnings trace back to poor gold-diggers in the 1800’s, with later influxes of discharged war veterans in the 1940’s and renewed waves of migration in the 1950’s to today. These were people coming to the city in search of a supportive community and opportunity to live their lives free from the oppressions facing the LGBT population in most of the rest of the country. In many cases, they left their families and friends behind seeking new relationships in the utopian nexus of San Francisco. Currently, the problem of aging with little to no familial support persists within the community, as many are discriminated against or face the fear of discrimination in conventional retirement settings. This project seeks to maintain and foster the utopian essence intrinsic to San Francisco. Like so many who left their native homes with a dream of the San Francisco utopia-by-the-bay, we leave the city’s ground plane behind to establish a series of new grounds: the unspoiled environment of The Arcadian Wilderness; the space of the body in The Haptic Sensorium; the quotidian field of The Life Collective; and the productive field of This Land is My Land?!. The ground plane is abandoned as already lost to the historic preservationists who have mandated a stasis at odds with the needs of utopia. Each of the new planes above seeks to create a space of possibility, freedom, community and release from the bodily cares of the world.
14
06
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
DAY 2 DAY
PROFESSIONAL: MATSYS // SU 2015 AUTODESK POP-UP GALLERY ADVISOR: Andrew Kudless TEAM: Alan Cation // Andrew Kudless // Clayton Muhleman
A generation ago, taking, printing, and archiving photos was time consuming and expensive, reserved for momentous occasions. Today, we constantly upload smartphone photos to an ever-expanding web of social media. They appear momentarily on our feeds and then disappear. We see a building, a pair of shoes, or a face that interests us and we snap it and upload it. Through automated geotagging, these moments in our lives aggregate into a shared social desire of a specific time and place. day2day is a robotic installation that celebrates time and place through the painted transcription of this collective yet disparate narrative. It searches a chosen location and selects the most-liked photos, then custom scripts convert the linework into instructions for a robot to paint. Over a two-week period, the robot will produce a scroll of 250 individual scenes: a hard copy of our shared lives as seen through social media. The installation consists of a universal robot (UR5) equipped with a custom end effector; a website that serves the robot files via Instagram and displays the final results; python scripts that create the robot’s toolpaths; and a custom table with an automated paper roll. These components document a geolocation’s Instagram feed in real time using an ink brush.
16
07
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
VOLATILE MUTATION
ACADEMIC: CCA // SP 2014 PERFORMATIVE ORNAMENT ADVISOR: Adam Marcus TEAM: Alan Cation // Dustin Tisdale // Tim Henshaw-Plath
The age of computation allows us to rethink and frame the contemporary facade around systemic flows of information and digitally fabricated construction techniques, both to maximize performance and provide aesthetic ornamental value. To address the notion of the contemporary building envelope, Volatile Mutation leverages computational genetic logic coupled with hybrid modes of production as a driver for the design of a highly variable facade system, employing differential performance criteria by maximizing variation with a limited number of distinct components. The design of the facade system is comprised of individual quadrilateral cast modules that each have a genetic composition of 4 different triangular components, or “genotypes”. There are a total of 4 genotypes ranging from most open to most closed. A limit of 4 genotypes allows for a total possibility of 256 unique modules with varying degrees of openness. The genetic logic becomes intrinsic to the facade’s modes of production, combining contemporary digital fabrication techniques with techniques as ancient as casting. Each genotype is designed in articulated detail specifically for fused filament 3d printing. These rigid 3D printed positive forms lead to flexible negative urethane molds that can be combined to produce one of our 256 possible modules.
18
GENOTYPE 01
GENOTYPE 02
GENOTYPE 03
GENOTYPE 04
ALL POSSIBLE MODULE COMBINATIONS
MODULE COMBINATIONS (-) ROTATION
MODULE CONSTRUCTION PROCESS
08
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
BAY STREET FACADE
PROFESSIONAL: SAW // SU 2014 COMPUTATIONAL FACADE DEVELOPMENT ADVISOR: Dan Spiegal INDIVIDUAL
Strategy one was to maximize variation utilizing one unique panel that can rotate to create a differing affect. We sought to create a panelized façade system that could imply dynamic movement while benefiting from repetition and economies of scale. These panels use a series of control points to match edge conditions, allowing the eccentric topography to continue from one panel to the next, regardless of the panel orientation. As such, each panel has four possible positions, allowing for a vast number of different surface patterns, all generated from a single cast-concrete mold. We applied this system to a variety of different surface geometries, deploying the same logic to create a wide array of aesthetic conditions. Strategy two was to create a stucco facade utilizing custom water-jet fins as expansion joints. The surface continuity of stucco facades are generally disrupted by the necessity of expansion joints to allow for the movement of material in various conditions over time. The result is typically the visual “panelization” of a material that is applied continuously, in situ. In this study, we seek to capitalize on the expansion joint as a way to generate a new surface continuity (rather than discontinuity) for the stucco facade.
20
ONE PANEL
SYSTEM WITH ROTATION FOR VARIABLE AFFECT
ONE PANEL
SYSTEM WITH ROTATION FOR VARIABLE AFFECT
09
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
ROBOTIC GEOLOGIES
PROFESSIONAL: Autodesk // FA 2015 AUTODESK ARTIST IN RESIDENCE ADVISOR: N/A TEAM: Alan Cation // Clayton Muhleman
Robotic Geologies engages with the material reality of 3D printing at an architectural scale. This is research extended from both Swarming MATR and Swarmscapers that focuses on the materiality of a powder-bed print method, which utilizes sand as an on-site fine aggregate material in conjunction with cement to create a catalytic bonding substrate. The aim was to experiment with form, structure, aperture, resolution, layer height, and tectonic span. In order to test concrete as a material, we built a custom 3D printer using a gantry and nozzle to pump bonding agent onto the aggregate material. This allowed for the creation of highly intricate tool-paths, where the primary limitations occurred in the form of material expansion for resolution. Through this research, we began to improve the technique and were met with successes and failures that informed each subsequent print. Structural networks allowed for strong and relatively lightweight formations that work well with such a print technique.
22
10
ALAN CATION // WORK SAMPLES
DRAGON SHELL PAVILION
ACADEMIC: CCA // FA 2013 SYNTHETIC TECTONICS ADVISOR: Jason Kelly Johnson TEAM: Alan Cation // Leah Zaldumbide // Dennis Huang
Dragon Shell investigates the tectonic relationship between computational physics simulation as a form-finding mechanism and the physical construct, which is precision-fabricated using CNC technologies. Utilizing a direct computer-to-fabrication feedback loop allowed us to rapidly prototype and test possibilities for the construction. The final output is a funicular shell structure that is inhabitable for a variety of programmatic functions, with a variable degree of porosity and opacity as one moves throughout the structure. Dragon Shell is intended to be designed as a full pavilion proposal, and this is a full-scale prototype of one section of the pavilion. Utilizing kangaroo as a physics simulation engine, we were able to design a structurally stable shell with triangulated openings to evenly distribute the forces. My roll in the project was to design the overall pavilion using a custom grasshopper script, write a definition to lay out all of the pieces for fabrication, and prepare shop and presentation drawings. All drawings are my own.
24
GENERATIVE LOGIC
01) DEFINE POINTS & POLYGON
02) SCALE POLYGON & CREATE MESH WITH VOID
03) SUBDIVIDE MESH & ESTABLISH ANCHOR POINTS
04) APPLY FORCE UPWARD TO GENERATE FUNICULAR SHELL FORMATION
05) APPLY SKIN TRIANGULATION AND GENERATE OPENINGS
06) CREATE STRUCTURE FOR MATERIAL STABILITY
SKIN & STRUCTURE LAID OUT FOR FABRICATION