MAKING+ MEANING
WENDY GUERRERO
TABLE OF CONTENTS 1.0 LINE / BLACK AND WHITE / GRID MANIPULATIONS 1-11 2.0 SURFACE/ GREYSCALE/ BACKGROUND 12-22 3.0 VOLUME / COLOR / INTERIORITY 23-36
MAKING + MEANING 2016 SCI-Arc
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1.0 LINE / BLACK AND WHITE / GRID MANIPULATIONS This first series of exercises introduces you to key conventions and skills of architectural design and representation, while posing a series of contemporary disciplinary problems regarding the relationship between ideas and tools and form and representation. It asks you to consider the grid as an organizational and aesthetic structure, in two- and three-dimensions, against which folds, deviations and figures can be read. It also asks you to consider the relationships between the infinite thinness of vector lines and the unavoidable thicknesses of materials and between physical objects and their shadows and projections. Through these exercises, you should explore the potential for distortion and invention that comes from translations between digital and physical mediums. Lectures discuss the history and role of descriptive geometry, orthographic projections and regulating grids in architecture, and introduce recent projects that demonstrate the contemporary state of these topics and provide a context for these exercises. Tutorials introduce fundamental techniques of line drawing and wireframe modeling in Rhino, line weight and line type in Adobe Illustrator, digital scanning, photography and photo-editing in Adobe Photoshop, printing, physical modeling using sticks and sheet materials and laser-cutting.
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1.1 FOLDED GRID A series of grids are created that vary in direction, line weight, and pattern. The grids are then consciously folded in order to produce a disruption in the existing order that is associated with the systematic grid.
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1.2 WIREFRAME GRID
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The folded grids take 3D form as a wireframe. After they have been photographed as physical structures, they are translated back into a flat surface model that incorporates the physical model and its orthographic projections.
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1.3 PROJECTED GRID The translated 2D forms are laser cut and assembled to create a volumetric form. Details to be considered are how lines are read both as 2D forms and 3D forms and how to accurately translate those properties. When assembling the volumetric form my approach was to create a form that had equal weight on all sides. When producing the initial grids for this series of exercises, the three grids had a varying amount of weights, geometries, and directions. I thoughtfully assembled the pieces to appear as if they were were related and not forced. I also considered how the volumetric form would sit and interact with other flat surfaces.
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1.3
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2.0 SURFACE/ GREYSCALE/ BACKGROUND In the second week of exercises, students will consider the interior corner ‘site’ of their preceding assignments as an object to examine a series of design procedures relating to surface, texture, shade, and background. Lectures will discuss the role of rendering tone, texture, pattern, lighting, and environment in the construction of images. Historic and recent examples from architecture, art, and commercial photography will sample a range of issues and techniques. Tutorials will expand on the digital modeling techniques introduced in the first week with particular emphasis on orienting and extruding profile curvature, trimming and intersecting surface geometry, and preparing digital models for CNC fabrication. Additional lighting, photography, and photo-editing techniques will be used. .
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2.1
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2.1 PLEATS Using a folding method on paper, pleats are created that have varying peaks and valleys that produce a range of shadow, highlights, texture and dimension.
2.2 PLEATS AND SLIPPAGES The pleats are superimposed on top of each other to create more complex spatial relationships that are reinforced by the shadows, tones, and gradation.
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2.3 SUBTRACTIVE PLEATS Through the slippages that were created from the pleats, line weights and depth were assigned to the lines and its shadows, The method of subtracting volume from a cork mass gave a result that closely mirrored the slippage pleat it was derived from. The angles are visible and this pattern is carried throughout the rest of the work.
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2.4 COLOR CHANNELS The original pleats were also used in this exercise where color was explored by using existing shadow and tones to create textures. Three images were selected to be three faces of the cube, shadow and highlights were applied to the images . The images where then divided in to RGB channels and half tones were employed to create different results.
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3.0 VOLUME, COLOR, INTERIORITY The third topic of the course introduces students to relationships of volume and color. Techniques derived from painting and printing will be the basis for understanding how color can be both dependent and independent of volumetric form, and how color alters our perception of it. Lectures discuss a brief history of color from the standpoint of science and the arts, and establish fundamental terms for describing the characteristics of color. An historical discussion of painterly techniques describes how color and form interact on the two dimensional canvas, from the Renaissance to the work of Josef Albers. Digital applications of color in modern-day printing will be introduced. The lecture will conclude with a discussion of the relationship of three-dimensional form and color, including examples of more contemporary investigations. Skills will continue to work with digital modeling in Rhino, color applications in Adobe Photoshop, hand-built paper models, 3D printing and model photography. .
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3.1 SERIAL VARIATION: TRANSFORMATION AND AGGREGATION Three “families” of cubic objects were produced by performing a series of transformations such as scaling and rotating. From these families 2-4 cubes were combined to create a more complex cubic form.
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3.1 SERIAL VARIATION: TRANSFORMATION AND AGGREGATION (CON.) Of these new cubic forms I selected one that had irregular parallel cubes juxtaposed with formal cubes that intersected at the centroid. I further simplified the form by removing 2 cubes , while ensuring the essence of the original form remained intact.
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3.2
3.2 TEXTURE MAPPING Using the texture from 2.4 , it was mapped onto the final cubic form. Various versions of the texture were paired with different mapping styles to produce variation. Since the form was angular and had radial qualities I decided to choose a softer color that would contrast and would lay on the surfaces differently to make each face stand independently from one another.
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3.3 SUBTRACTIONS A new cubic form is created using members from the mapped cubic forms family . This new form mimics its juxtaposed qualities. The textured cubic form is used as a subtraction device to create an interior and exterior.
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3.3 SUBTRACTIONS (CON.) The approach I chose was to scale the textured cubic form up and punctuate the exterior form to visibly see where and how the subtraction was made. The most recognizable part of the cubic form is its two irregular parallel forms. Those two are registered in the exterior. Since contrasting was a them carried througout these series of exercisesI I wanted to keep the subtraction simple to counteract its complex form.