Marc@Studio

So today we learned a bit about Rhino, I'm excited to use it in the future, specially with its unwrap and lay flat or whatever command. I'm kind of a software junky, I like to use a lot of different stuff to make things work, so today I must admit i was not paying completely full attention because I was doing some research on rhino and some other cool programs. There's Vue, which does an amazing job on landscapes... It'll grow trees on surfaces with almost no effort, and no two trees are alike, as they're grown from an algorithm rather than just the same tree over and over again. Then there's some stuff I found in relation to the Rhino website, like Maxwell, which looks to be a lighting engine plugin for Rhino maybe? It looks sweet regardless. Then I found Mudbox, which sounds terrible, and looks to be useless for us, as it is mainly a character creation program, but maybe it could be good for something, and works by brushing geometry onto cubes, spheres, etc rather than solid modeling...Also, in terms of charchters, peeps, there's Poser, which interfaces with Vue really well, and is pretty simple to use.

the image on the right is rendered in Vue from the image on the left, from sketchup. It took a long time to render because it's fairly high resolution, but took about a half an hour to actually create. Its important to remember that we can make things real pretty and still they won't work without understanding the physical properties involved, but they are real pretty....

so today Tara and I worked on constructing the jig for our big (read:HUGE!) model. It reminds me of creating formwork for concrete structures, which got me thinking about tilt-up slab construction, which got me (just now) thinking about a way to create a mesh with one fixed end and then tilting up the opposing end into place and then fixing it, rather than pushing/pulling sections to create a shape. I'm sort of becoming fascinated with this idea of being able to support traitional structures with gridshells. I think it may be a bit unsettling to see such a support in real life, but I was always taught that tension was a more efficient structural system than compression. anyway, Tara and I finished the jig, and we should hopefully be able to get the grid all together tommorow, as we still have to figure out our boundary edge condition, as well as how we want to build the column. I've also been thinking about a asymmetrical grid system, and have drawn up some ideas to be cut for a system when all the lathes are connected by a single bolt on one end, and attatched to a curved element with slotted holes on the other. I've set up score lines on centers to see whether the lathes actually travel within their slots when manipulated... anyway i think this is probably hard to understand so i'll move on.
I also had an idea for a tool today. Tara and I were trying to extrapolate points onto a piece of cardboard that was about 1/4" above the piece we were taking the points from, so I thought about a little metal piece that could slide around and transfer those points vertically. I want to builld it, the problem is I don't have access to a milling machine. Damn.

some images of a quick little test i did to check on this one fixed end thing, and also to see whether I could do it, as this can't be done in sketchup with the sandbox tool.

so i just finished reading the article for this weekend, and I have to admit it took all day to get through, mostly because I could only read a page or two at a time. The article did a fairly good job of explaining the construction process, and I enjoyed looking at their new idea for a node connection, but I thought the article could have been more critical towards the process, there is little explanation of parts that did not work as well as they could have. The main problems I gathered from the article in regards to construction seem to be the length of the materials (so many finger joints) and the construction method itself, as in pulling and pushing the gridded mat up and down to get the shape. It seemed there were alot of changes in the process as the building went up, which I think is inevitable in the construction of any building.
I wonder if there could be a way of staggering the lathes of material, so as to avoid problems of joining two pieces into a single length.
hmm...

I think what is so interestng about grid shell, pneumatic, etc structures is that there is some sense of magic in their design, even for architects. The forms are too complex for us to fully comprehend like we can a truss or column beam system. We sort of have to design all we can and then let nature's magic hold up the building. I'm trying to build a sketchup model of the expodach, which is proving very difficult, because we can sort of get the height of a number of points to construct a curve, but all the space within, all the drapery of the structure, is total mystery to me, so i will admit, i'm totally fudging it, just getting as close to the outer curves as I can.
I like these types of structures for their experiential quality, the space we can create seem both indoor and outdoor, both enclosed and totally open, both confined and vast. It reminds me of a visit to Chicago on a study tour, in which we walked all over the city and eventually reached millenium park, where the amphitheatre by Gehry was. And experienceing the sort of front stage/backstage elements of the bandshell itself were intersting, but surely not as interesting as being under the grassed field covered with intertwining threads of metal. The experience was amazing, you walked from a sidewalk, feeling completely outdoors, hearing the cars and people and the breath of the city, and then stepping under these metal threads gave an aural sensation of being indoors. The echoes changed slightly, so you felt as though you were enclosed, even though the space was definetly open air. I think it would be interesting to see a concert at this venue, because I would enjoy watching people look around suprised as it began to rain. Anyway, I'm interested in this experiential quality of space in whatever it is we end up designing.

just checking to see if this works...