Module 4

Life is a dance, Petals is the dancer.

Xeyiing Ng Student No : 596296

Semester 2/2012

Group 14

“I believe I am made to be something more...”

Hi,

this is the story of Petals, a character you would soon come to know. Petals is not an imagined character, quite real in fact. Seen by many, yet so little have notice; too many have felt the presence but not a handful who have taken the time to understand. One day Petals heard a voice, Petals thought it sounded rather like a heavenly voice, but I am rather confident it was Petals’ inner voice; then again this was what Petals heard,

“All things are constantly changing, the change however is not random and it takes on certain patterns. Patterns can be found everywhere, in the growth of shells and plants, even among the huge city, where we have fixed structures yet there are still changes in between them, i.e. the human traffic. Many of the patterns having underlying rules and codes that are yet to be discovered, such patterns help govern the formation of things around us. When we understand the rules behind it, we are able to apply it to other purposes.”

Precedent: Pattern Formation, Virtual Environments, Sem2/2012 Lecture 1

Inspired, Petals decided it was time to change, time to be noticed, time to transform, and this is how our story starts…

Observing Petals Petals’ new found passion in transforming himself had him digging deep into his roots. Petals did not get right to the point where he would end up being at from the start, and it may seem like a troublesome process to go over, it is actually a development process which helps broaden views, setting up a solid foundation for development of ideas.

Speaking of form and context, Petals made a very wonderful choice of building his dance progression using paper.

The dominant characteristic of waves, its flexibility, would have been deducted away in the use of other materials and the representation of waves would have been less convincing. The paper had the rigidity to hold the form yet possess the ability to bend.

When the wind blew, Petals would dance; sometimes people find it scary, other times people run towards it. Waves, waves on the sea, that’s Petal’s dance, but Petals is not a wave, Petals is a wave surface particle.

“I love dancing with the wind.”

Petals’ dance had a pattern; up and down the wave goes and underneath, Petals go round and round. When its’ fast enough, petals stop dancing in closed loops and starts dancing in a spiral pattern, or scientists call it the ‘stroke drift’.

‘Waves never propagate simultaneously, one is always moving faster or slower than the other.’

- Petals

So Petals dance, The wind is never predictable and Petals always had a different dance. When it’s closer to the beach, Petals danced more vigorously, expressive and energetic, and when it’s further in the ocean, Petals often dance like a trained ballerina, graceful yet passionate.

With that, Petals came up with his very first form, his dance progression.

And dance...

Petals wasn’t exactly sure what he was heading for, but he knew the dance progression wasn’t it. Remembering the time he was near a volcanic eruption, the energy he received and that enthusiastic dance he had, Petals then came up with a new concept for the dance, temperature variation. Observing himself, Petals knew that as a particle, he had a basic shape of a triangle lumped together with the others to form a rhombus, he also knew that with a little extra heat, he could easily break free from the others and be an individual, and with a little less heat, Petals could turn into a hexagon. This meant that, the closer Petals is to be a triangle, the more vigorous his dance would be. On another note, the overall form is to resemble a triangle, the very basic form of Petals.

“This is still not it yet.”

Petals knew he was meant for something more, but he had to admit he was stuck. The initial forms were too random and were hardly reliable, Petals needed a way to produce and test his forms consistently. Once again, the voice spoke to Petals,

“In the digital design space, the possible moves are defined, hence limited, however even in the defined space, the possibilities are so great that at times even when the computational rules are all predictable, it is impossible to see the end stage as ‘too much’ is going on for the human brain to interpret everything.”

Precedent: Design to Assembly, Virtual Environments, Sem2/2012 Lecture 6

Now all Petals need is a digital friend… and who else but RHINO.

Observing Petals As anticipated by Petals, digitalisation has increased the accuracy and consistency of the design that no human hands can achieve. This virtual space allows work to be thoroughly reviewed before production, recreated again and again with consistency and as I read, “If you know that your environment will be there, as you left it, the next time you log in, then you have some motivation to invest time and resources improving it.”

Precedent: Replacing Place, William J. Mitchell

Indeed, the main feature most people tend to neglect is the saving of data. It is this function that provides the consistency and accuracy in digital forms and the recreation of data to be performed.

Many designing medias flood the market these days, but each software are specifically programmed for specific inputs and outputs. If not pre-defined in the software, the function wouldn’t be present hence further limiting the outcomes. Digitalisation was a smart move, going to RHINO, the 3D expert is Petal’s best move.

RHINO is a picky friend.

RHINO had one condition, “A perfect model is one that contains as little information as nec¬essary to describe the properties of an object unambiguously. It came to light that all the details in the previous model would not be effectively projected in Rhino, hence losing the initial purpose of the design in representing the concept. Using abstraction, reducing the infinite complexity to a level where it can be described easily, and reduction, finding the optimal way to present the concept, the design wassimplfied to ‘perfection’.

Precedent: Lost in Parameter Space, Scheurer F. & Stehling H.

Taking RHINO’s advice, Petals simplified his dance moves. The number of individual sticks were reduced; the circles are converted into spheres with the waves going around its’ equatorial axis hence ‘solidifying’ the form.

“Parameter Space here I come!”

“I was painfully sliced individually to retain my original outline then photographed and imported into Rhino. Must have looked hideous in the 1cm thick chopped up version of me.”

“I was ticklishly traced in Rhino using polylines. Tracing was done using the photographs only as the radius’s reference, seeing that I was very much squashed by this stage.”

Petals’ long awaited consistency.

“Leaving my physical form, the traced curves were stacked above each other with equal spacing in between. My first virtual draft.”

“To finally close me up, points were added on each end of the petals and then I was lofted together with the curves.”

Petals’ first Digital Skin!

And boy, he just won’t stop admiring himself; front view, side view, top view... You name it he’s done it.

Under the guidance of RHINO, Petals successfully placed himself into the ‘Parameter Space’, the consistency he longed for.

Oh, did I mention? RHINO forced him to keep a progress journal; this is going to be fun.

“Just what I needed.”

30 St Mary Axe

Architect : Norman Foster Location : London, UK The 30 St Mary Axe building is also known as the Gherkin is a tower of 180m tall with 41 floors and stands on the site of the former Baltic Exchange.

Reading about the building somewhere, Petals got three things out of it: 1.

Spirals, Twirls!

Spirals surrounding the building reminded Petals of the dance move he was so good at. Observing how the spiral was so carefully incorporated into the design, prominent yet sits perfectly in the overall structure.

2. The triangular patterns The building is one without extra reinforcements. The triangles allowed the building to achieve a certain amount of stiffness. It is also this exact same triangle that provided a ‘pathway’ for the spiral to move.

3. Diamond grid instead of a square grid In panelling the surface, a diamond grid allows a smooth spiral to take form. Using the diamond grid, the spiral movement was successfully incorporated into the design flawlessly.

Petals’ signature dance - Twirling Realising he had been missing his most significant dance move: the stroke drift, all these while. Petals decided to make that spiral move as prominent as possible. After all, it was his signature. But how?

Out of nowhere, the voice said, “Among the many ways of developing a concept as mentioned in the lecture, the use of lights should enhance the concept. The shadows formed and the intensity of light are great ways to vary the design.”

Precedent: Design to Assembly, Virtual Environments, Sem2/2012 Lecture 6

Lights it is then to highlight his twirls and the intensity of lights to effectively show the change in temperature instead of the different polygons which could be left to focus on the Petals’ basic structure.

Notice how the shadow effect caused by the folded spiral paper closely resemble the stroke drift formed waves?

Interesting...

‘To-Achieve-List’ Petals finally knew what he really wanted, he knew what he wanted his dance to represent and he knew how he wants his dance to look like. I found his list and a sketch he drew, he’s pretty ambitious I would say.

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What Petals actually managed to achieve...

See the repeating triangles unit? Converting the panels’ grid into the diamond grid, Petals panelled 2D the surface with square triangles units to show his very basic form. The diamond grid and the repeating triangle units supported Petals’ twirls perfectly, allowing Petals to sway and dance to his very best.

Tracing his spiral twirl, Petals used ‘fin edges’ which were then connected with additional surfaces to form a trench beneath the 2D surface. This was perhaps the best thing that could happen, Petals wanted lights to enhance his twirls and he has now got it.

Petals wanted a little irregularity in his dance but he couldn’t seem to get there. Now in a consistent world, petals wanted inconsistency, the irony… RHINO then said, Algorithms and computational programs in general require a well-defined parameter space which in turn results in the limitations of the design outcomes. The fact that every single move of the program is predictable limits the flexibility of the design. The consistency of the computational program prevents the development of the design according to sketch.

Precedent : Lost in Parameter Space, Scheurer.F & Stehling H.

Understanding the limitations that it is almost impossible to recreate materials in the physical world perfectly in the virtual space, Petals took the best of what he could make out of.

Time to get physical.

True enough, RHINO has taught Petals much and his development would not have come this far without it, but now Petals didn’t want to stay in this confined space anymore, as consistent as he was, he wasn’t real like you and I and as promising as the virtual space may sound, its’ like school days all over again, you never really learn until you get into the real world. I am getting suspicious of this voice Petals keeps hearing, anyway, this time it says, A prototype is a ‘first of its’ kind’, one that is closest to the real thing. Prototypes have 4 main functions, to test the model’s spatial type, allows trials and errors, to test the model’s performance and its’ constrains and the effect of the model. The lecturer said, ‘Prototype helps.’ So indeed the prototypes helped by performing the mentioned functions. In fact by building prototypes, it helps the development of the ideas as the model come alive.

Precedent: Furniture to Facades, Virtual Environments, Sem2/2012 Lecture 8

And as always, Petals did what he was told. Petals needed practice in the real world.

Observing Petals Watching Petals choreograph his dance moves, practice after practice, improving flaws after flaws to achieve ‘Perfection’, it started me thinking, how did we not see the flaw right from the start, in virtual space so closely resembled to the real world? The answer is probably due to the materials properties that the digitalised space failed to incorporate revealing the limitations of the digital media. It is however undeniable is that the practicing process had allowed great improved in the overall form, enhancing Petals’ experience. The downside to it all thou is that after so many practices, Petals had wasted quite a fair bit of paper now…

“Practice makes perfect”

Petals’ first attempt failed terribly. The twirls in their four-sided polygon form did not lie on the same plane, hence did not fit into each other, leaving Petals in a huge mess.

So Petals learned that the only way for the twirl to work is to ‘triangulate’ as triangles do not deform under pressure. The perfect recipe for hardcore practice.

The triangulated twirls worked! Howeve when Petals added in the ‘outer surface’ dance, they become too crammed and fail to sync.

So Petals practice,

A whole new apporach to the twirls was taken, Petals thought, “If it’s crammed, we put gaps in it.” Not only did that solved the ‘crammed up’ problem of his twirls, it produces a uniform direction resulting in a neat and clean move. The twirls are now in order. Problem solved.

2. Offset mesh to 2 different distances.

3. Join outer surface with trench faces in pattern shown.

1. Close twirls’ gaps with surfaces, then convert to mesh.

4. Delete mesh, close base with triangular surfaces.

And practice, So Petals decided to change.

1. Triangular holes with varying density were populated on the surface using the ‘pt offset faces borders’.

Petals didn’t like the triangular holes, they let too much light through, distracting people from his’ signature twirl.

2. Drawing lines on the unrolled strips, the triangles were manually changed to arrows.

“The triangular holes converted to arrows reduces the surface areas of holes, reducing the amount of light penetrating them thus focusing it on my twirls.” - Petals

Perfection under progression...

To be a dancer, Petals have to be visually appealing. All the moves has now may be distinct to a professional but to the common, they pretty much looked the same. To create distinction, Petals applied the ‘Hot matter rises, cold matter sinks.’ concept into his dance. The arrows point into the direction of movement.

And Petals kept on practicing..

Frustrated with white still not clearly highlight his twirls, Petals dumped white and turned to black. Black was especially good at blocking light but however creates obvious spots of lights on the surface. Thou the contrast bringing attention to the twirls, which was what Petals was really looking for.

Now the twirls are clearly visible, the rest was no big deal for Petals. To his dance, he added ’columns’ which allow lights to be attached hence leaving it a distance from the surface, creating an evenly distributed lighting without obvious spots of light on surfaces.

‘Perfection’ Achieved.

Petals had it easy, with the current technology such as laser cutting which uses pre-defined coordinates in the digital file, allowing complicated shapes to be easily cut out with precision. Had it been a few centuries back, such accuracy and consistency was definitely impossible.

“This one’s easy, all you have to do is strip me down and label me accordingly. Easy Peasy.”

“This is slightly more complicated, a little extra effort will do the trick.”

Top

“Unroll my middle twirls individually. Using panelling tools ‘Unroll faces’ label the edges.”

Middle “Label all pieces according to their sequence.”

Bottom

The Real Deal.

a. Referring to the digital file, label and cut strips.

d. Referring to the digital file, cut and label the strips.

b. Glue the individual middle trenches to the bottom trench.

e. Piece strips accordingly to the trenches.

c. Piece the top trench in place.

f. Leave the last strip and the trench unglued.

g. Fold score lines. Mark and cut LEDs’ positions according to trench.

h. Glue edges together.

i. Make needle holes for LEDs’ posts and tape where holes are made. Insert LEDs’ into designated positions.

j. Strip wires and connect LEDs in parallel. Connect all positive posts and negative posts to separate wires.

k. Bend LEDs’ posts. Insert papers pieces in between LED posts.

l. Test circuit by connecting to power supply. Close surface to form a column if all LEDs light up, leaving the circuit connected until surface is fully closed.

m. Glue end triangles of one end to close model.

n. Leave the other end open with the wires and fishing lines hanging out.

o. Glue end of wooden sticks to columns.

p. Insert column with LEDs and stick inside.

q. Close ends of petals, using a ‘Square Lashing Knot� tie both sticks together, then join the wire ends to the power supply.

r. Connect Petal 1 and 5 at each end with fishing lines, hang Petal 3 using fishing lines on the knot.

If life is a dance, Petals is a kick-ass dancer!

“How did I come this far?� - Petals’ Reflection The first me had four main concepts: 1. The forces governing the different structures of particles 2. The circular motion of wave particles 3. The progression of waves from hot to cold regions 4. The change in temperature May be it was the volcano, may be not, but the first me had great focus placed on the different structures of particles at different temperatures and immense precision placed in angles and measurements. Rhombus, triangles and hexagons represented the temperature change, were part of my dance. The more aggressive my dance is, the greater the radius of the circle, hence the greater the temperature.

It has been choreographed with such detail but sadly could not be brought into the virtual space. The digitalisation method used would not successfully represent the details present.

In response to that, a simplified me was produced. Most of my moves from the first model were taken off and I only represented one main concept that is the progression of waves from hot to cold regions.

So it all started with me, a basic wave particle. During the process of development, concepts have been modified and change to present a better me.

In the virtual space, concepts were reintroduced and new concepts were brought in. Practically, digitalised me and the final me have only minority differences. The main dance moves are then: 1. The stroke drift of wave particles a.k.a. the twirl 2. The progression of waves from hot to cold regions 3. The basic form of wave particles (water atoms) 4. The change in temperature 5. The principle of ‘Hot matter rises, cold matter sinks.’

Comparing digitalised me and first me, varying intensity of lights were used instead of polygons to show temperature change. The use of lights distincts from all the other geometries present hence is more visually desirable. My signature dance, the stroke drift, was introduced as a prominent feature occurring in the phenomena of waves. Besides, the spiral effect of the stroke drift produces a wave like feature on the overall form. The principle is represented using arrows which points in the direction of movement.

Final me and first me had only one dance left in common, the progression of waves from hot to cold regions. It is also this concept which governs our general forms resulting in the similar outline.

Final me used a mixture of black and white to bring contrast and attention to the stroke drift. The use of black paper enhances the effect of the varying light intensity. To distinct all five petals however, arrows with different direction and density were incorporated and the varying intensity of twirls were used. The attempt was however unsuccessful as the contrast distracts almost all attention.

Connecting all 5 petals, the overall rigid form of me is considered as a successful one. The final me is a better dance of the wave particle concept as it ‘s simple as compared to the first me and yet still brings out the many detailed moves.

Behind The Scenes...

I see two learning sides to this subject, the technical development and the personal growth. Technically, I’ve been introduced to programmes I’ve long heard their names but never got around using it. Doubt that I’ve covered all that has to be learnt in the programmes but I am confident that this basic foundation would go a long way in my future studies especially since I am planning to further my studies as an architecture student and I don’t think having to learn a whole new programme on the verge of a major assignment is particularly helpful. The opportunity to work with laser cutters and card cutters during fabrication gave me an understanding of the working process of the machines; I now know what machine is best for what material with what kind of details in terms of cost and efficiency.

Personally, this subject has basically been an ‘Introduction to what your next three years as an architecture student will be’. All the late nights in the computer lab and the annoying part where ideas don’t come till it’s almost deadline and when the stress levels are high; the fact that I stuck through the whole subject without a single ‘I-give-up’ is probably the best indicator that I am walking down the right path.

If anything, this is definitely a confident boost.

Through lectures, seminars and readings, it is fascinating to learn that they are so many things that we have let it slip past us and taken for granted. It is probably a way to tell us that design inspiration in everywhere, whether or not we see it takes the right experiences. The seminars and the final parade was a great presentation learning platform. To build and to design is one thing; to however justify and make others see what you see is another, both criteria are mutually dependent. For others to appreciate ones’ work, others must see what the designer sees,as beauty is too subjective to define.

The greatest learning experience I had is however, ‘You are never really done.’ The designing process is never a straight line and with every passing day, there’s always room for changes and for improvements. Even with a submitted project, although no further changes can be made to it, improvements can always be applied to future projects. This is one spirit that I will definitely hold true to for as long as I am in designing, or at least until a better one comes along.

Reference List http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_wave http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_wave http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/30_St_Mary_Axe Scheurer.F, Stehling, H (2011), Lost in Parameter Space? IAD : Architectural Design, Wiley, 81(4), July, pp. 70-79 Fleischmann M., Knippers J., Menges A., Schleicher S. (2012), Material Behavior : Embedding Physical Properties in Computational Desgin Processes, D: Architectural Desing, Wiley, 82(2), March, pp. 44-51 Lecture 5 ,6 (2012), Virtual Environments, Sem 2 2012 Mitchell, W. (2000): Replacing Place In The Digital Dialectic, P. Lunenfeld (ed.) MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, p. 112-127