Analysing the notion of ecosystems as seen emerging within current design and construction processes. Through examples we explore ecosystem both as a modelling tool for representing urban patterns—as conceived by Christopher Alexander—and by extension as metaphor for digitally sponsored collaboration. Our first test case—an agent-based dynamic simulation combining natural and built environmental components—is deployed to explore the city as multitude of interrelated natural and built patterns. We analyse the role this simulation might play in managing the complexities of rebuilding a sustainable urban environment after a natural disaster. Where it might be leveraged to avoid patterns of land usage that, if combined with topology and known wind patterns, will cause smog; or as a means to explore pathways to future city configurations. The second test case explores the development of a mobile application and methodology for enriching relationships within BIM (building information model) ecosystems.

Dr McMeel will be speaking at TU Vienna’s Institute of Urban Development, Infrastructure and Environmental Plannings city space simulation lab [srl:sim] on the 9th of July.

The Class of 2012

Divergence
Architect – Kelly
Dancers – Maeling, Sam, Pauline, Nita, Kriste, Nicole, Catlin, Sophie

Darkness Distrubed
Architects – Simone, KyungYuen, Geun Yeong
Dancers – Jehan, Lindsay, Emma, Chantelle

Sense-itivity
Architects – Patrica, David, Jarong
Dancers – Geppina, Samantha, Anglique, Paige, Jinsol

You can see the making of sense-itivity [here].

Transportation arteries have – by and large – emerged from what Jeremy Rifkin [1] calls‚ ‘energy systems’ and the associated nodes of energy production and consumption. He cites our reliance on – and continued adherence to – patterns formed during the first industrial revolution. Whether we choose to meditate on the historical development of canals, railways or roads, the energies of production and consumption would seem to still largely inform transportation networks in the 21st Century. Public and private transportation systems appropriate these industrial arteries and we find habitation and commerce emerging as accretions round them. The information used by planning specialists to design transportation today continues to be informed by the energy patterns of production and consumption of habitation, commerce and industry. The primary foundations on which we continue to build and plan cities are these unquestioned historic pillars.

http://auckland.academia.edu/DermottMcMeel/Papers/1632557/Energy_Patterns_and_Urbanisation

Steve Jobs with an agent of his closed ecosystem

Perhaps these concerns resonate within design and construction? As a student I was prevented from submitting a completely ‘computerised’ design submission – hand drawings were required. The role of computing in design has long been contested – and probably will continue to do so. Case studies by Richard Coyne point to computing empowering the small to medium sized enterprises to compete with much larger firms. However Bryan Lawsons What Designers Know is overwhelmingly populated with drawings by hand, not computer. Perhaps suggestive of our most revered designers resistance to computers as it dulls their creativity.

Soft Table

Design is emerging from a period of closed computation, inasmuch as computation until recently closed design in digital formats, the processes of breaking out of computation was with traditional drawings for communication and tradesmen to build it. The current proliferation of affordable/DIY CNC routers and 3D printers open up the possibility of a more direct route for bridging design and fabrication. At least that is the assumption.

However in a modest table fabrication project that makes use, in part, a CNC router some observations and questions emerge:

-       More people are involved and less traditional documentation. Does this not increase the potential for more uncertainty in the designing/making process?

-       The process was no less complex than other potential ways of manufacturing.

-       There was manual process also required, sanding, oiling and over 3 hours of sanding by the author.

So if we are to meditate on this process, what, to paraphrase Heidegger, has been revealed in this new relationship with technology? Whereas we might argue designing and drawing in computer distances us from the reality of the making process and perhaps can mislead us regarding notions of precision, striations and smoothness in both buildings and in building process; the same cannot be said of the process of engaging in digital fabrication. In the video below we see considerable time invested calibration, positioning, techniques and methods for point registration. In consultation with the digital fabricator the table geometry was redesigned to be fabricated in less steps. Several iterations went back and forth to be discussed and refined – including the manufacture of a polystyrene prototype to investigate the nuances of process as much as product. With a traditionally skilled carpenter the idea was discussed, alternatives for assembly and how they might reinforce or undermine the concept were negotiated before finally some careful assembly and polishing – under the watchful eye of both carpenter and digital fabricator, in a peculiar modern day apprenticeship.

So if something has been revealed through technology it is a more personal engagement and understanding of making, of a phenomenological different experience and understanding of design process. Pit resists Marx claim that the underlying motivation of automation is to eventually replace people in the process. Rather it expanded by understanding of making, craftsmanship and reframed assumptions regarding appropriate design and manufacture methodologies. Arguably – they may help breed more resilient designers.

Soft Table on Vimeo

References

1.            Coyne, R., et al., Computers in Practice. 1996, University of Edinburgh: Edinburgh. p. 125.

2.            Lawson, B., What designers know. 2004, Oxford: Architectural. 160 p.

3.            Isaacson, W., Steve Jobs. 2011, London: Little, Brown. xix, 630 p., [14] of plates.

4.            Heidegger, M., The question concerning technology, and other essays. Harper colophon books. 1977, New York; London: Harper and Row. xxxix,182p.

5.            Marx, K., Grundrisse, in Karl Marx: Selected Writings, McClellan, D., Editor. 1977, Oxford University Press: Oxford.

This paper scrutinises examples of computationally assisted design through a constructivist philosophy, in doing so it invites us to ask if we ‘know’ design or space differently through these algorithmically intensive processes?

The point of departure for this enquiry is Rivka and Robert Oxman’s The New Structuralism. Here the Oxmans’ focus on fabrication and materialism as the foundation for reconsidering computation in design. We speculate computational processes are implicated in how we ‘know’ a process, design or space through these algorithmically enhanced methods. Constructivism advances this structuralist philosophy and provides a framework to assist our interrogation of computation and spatial design.

We will begin by looking at natural computation before presenting our first design examples; using natural algorithms to simulate the geometry of complex biological ecologies. These geometric exercises then morph into architecture, attempting to advance the organisation of complex buildings and urban spaces. We then introduce a second set of design examples, where the city is interrogated to expose its multitude of inter-related systems and ecologies. These ecologies are then modelled, creating a data intensive representation of place. Our analysis exposes the city as a ‘data whirlwind’ that is intensely unpredictable and dynamic. Cognitive scientist Andrew Clark posits technology can exert an influence on cognitive processes and thought (Clark 2001). We hypothesise the process of programming these ecologies is qualitatively different to the process of graphical representation; as such it changes the designers ‘knowing’ of the city.

This paper extends the current computational paradigm of geometric or material processes; it investigates how these processes—in the extreme—can shift understanding. While there is little originality in claiming that computing changes our perception of design, a constructivist ideology perhaps provides a framework to scrutinise the effects of this shift. Findings point to designers’ repelling from the fascination with geometrically gratuitous architecture. Rather, as we mine into the granular DNA of the built environment through artificial systems, computation can potentially bring to centre stage a means to intimately ‘know’ place.

1.     Ways of seeing

Firstly, in this section we review work that attends to ‘ways of seeing’ contemporary design and construction practice. Brano Kolarevic (Kolarevic 2003; Kolarevic and Klinger 2008) has written several anthologies that serve as timely barometers’ of the state of compuation in design over the last decade. A more recent offering is Rivka and Robert Oxman’s guest edited Architectural Design The New Structuralism (Oxman and Oxman 2010). Using a structuralist ideology The New Structuralism explores structures such as computing methodologies, digital/analogue systems and programming languages that currently drive design and engineering in the creation of architecture. We posit structuralism only interrogates part of the spatial equation. By proposing a constructivist ideology, which focuses on the question of knowledge, we complicate the Oxmans’ discourse. Designers’ are becoming more immersed in the granularity of this computation through software such as Rhino, Grasshopper and Generative Components. Consequently they are engaged in creative processes that are markedly different from geometric drawing, which historically (Bijl 1989; Coyne et al. 1996) dominated computer aided design (CAD). We draw into this discussion the designer and ask what influence do these granular and parametric processes exert on their ‘knowing’ of space. Our title—a new constructivism—is indicative of the notion that designers ‘know’ space differently through this shift in their relationship with computation.

1.1.   The New Structuralism

Structuralism lays claim to the notion that human behaviour is determined by various structures. Thomas Kuhn—being one of its notable proponents—undermined the established view that science was progressed through a gradual increase in established facts and theories. In his seminal text The Structures of Scientific Revolutions (Kuhn 1970) he argues the structure of enquiry as the important factor in scientific revolution and then revisits historical examples illustrating their adherence to this structure. Structuralism also emerged as an architectural movement in the middle of the 20^th Century. It also privileges the notion that systems and structures could underlie and drive architectural design; typically these were structures of function, space or circulation. In Oxmans’ The New Structuralism these systems are replaced with systems of computing that are implicated in geometry, structure, material and mathematical algorithms (Figure 1).

Figure 1: A computing structure producing geometry.

Space and structure are increasingly being designed through the articulation of the type of visual programming interface illustrated in Figure 1. This is perhaps taken to the extreme by Burry et. al. (Burry et al. 2011) and the work on the Sagrada Familia; recently proposing a modular approach to parametric design much like the modular approach to programming. The advantage of a modular approach to complex systems’ is in enabling freedom to change or modify a module; thus providing more creative freedom and the facility to embrace change. In these examples, systems are assisting the creation of geometries, structures and forms. Arguably The New Structuralism privileges the architectonics of space rather than space itself; as such it is perhaps inadequate to critique computationally assisted spatial design. We suggest the designer’s relationship with computing in the spatial design process must be considered and to do this we need to look beyond structuralism towards the tenets of constructivism.

1.2.   Constructivism

Constructivism’s perspective on knowledge is that a reality cannot be ‘known’. Where a structuralist might claim the structure is the reality of a phenomenon, a constructivist would argue it is a construction of reality, but not reality itself. Constructivist learning theory has particular currency here, which claims new knowledge is constructed from experience. Thus how we experience spatial design informs our individual and unique understanding of place.

Retuning to the implications of computation for the domain of architecture, Frank Gehry has famously claimed he does not use computers. In What Designers Know (Lawson 2004) we find a proliferation of architects hand-drawn sketches as Bryan Lawson seeks to demystify how designers ‘know’ design. While the sketch and draw have historically been romanticised in creative discourse, to continue to do so adds currency to the notion that computing may somehow interfere or adversely affect spatial design. Whether or not we choose to accept such a supposition, currently graduating from institutes are designers that are equally comfortable creating with a pen or through programming. So we ask how do designers know space through designing with parametric schemata and intensive computing?

1.3.   Test cases in computationally assisted spatial design

To help answer this question we will discuss two intensive design studios’ within a School of Architecture, which specialise in intensive computation. The first design studio focused on systems, and how they generate geometric form. Attention was drawn to natural algorithms such as L-systems, which are branching systems similar to how trees or rivers subdivide. Only once a system was thoroughly investigated was an architectural form generated. The second studio advances ideas of naturally occurring organisation to conceive of the city as inter-weaving systems that create a complex urban ecology. We use these studios’, the designers’ processes and expert critique to gain insights into the knowledge and skills being obtained by the designers and the attention—or lack of it—being focused on spatial concerns.

2.     Selected References

Bijl, Aart. 1989. Computer discipline and design practice: Shaping Our Future, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Burry, Mark, Jane Burry & Daniel Davis. 2011. “Untangling Parametric Schemata: Enhancing Collaboration through Modular Programming.”  CAAD Futures 2011: Designing together edited by Pierre Leclercq, Ann Heylighen & Geneviève Martin, Liège, Beligum: Les Editions de l’Université de Liège.

Clark, Andy. 2001. “Reasons, Robots and the Extended Mind,” Mind and Language, 16: 121-145.

Corbusier, Le. 1987. Vers une architecture, Oxford: Architectural Press.

Coyne, Richard, Sidney Newton, Sally McLaughlin, Ahmed Jumani, Fay Sudweeks & David Haynes (1996). Computers in Practice. Edinburgh, University of Edinburgh.

Kolarevic, Branko (Ed.) (2003). Architecture in the digital age – design and manufacturing, New York, Spon Press.

Kolarevic, Branko & Kevin R. Klinger (Eds.) (2008). Manufacturing material effects – Rethinking design and making in architecture, New York, Routledge.

Kuhn, Thomas S. 1970. The structure of scientific revolutions, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Lawson, Bryan. 2004. What designers know, Oxford: Architectural.

Oxman, Rivka & Robert Oxman. 2010. “The New Structuralism: Design, Engineering and Architcetural Technologies,” Architectural Design, 80.

Dr Dermott McMeel will be showcasing some Augmented Reality (AR) work at the University of Auckland’s Teaching and Learning Showcase on Tuesday 25th October 2011. This revolves around a cross-disciplinary ‘road-map’ has been developed between their architectural design (McMeel) and computer science (R. Amor) programmes’ for testing and delivering design/technology solutions. By aligning design and computing courses they have been able to generate a combination of innovative and new approaches to communication as well as deliver robust and reliable applications for use on mobile phones and tablet computing devices. The presentation will cover their approach to inter-disciplinary work in a teaching context, which flows into their research and into industry and the private sector. They will illustrate their processes with several Augmented Reality ‘work-in-progress’ projects including their dissemination via research outputs (Journals & Conferences) and Industry (private sector problems, solutions & partnerships).

Construction AIDs: Augmented Information Delivery The potential delivery of design information via AR (augmented reality) to construction sites through smartphones and tablet computing devices.

ARchi: The use of augmented reality for ‘snagging’ via mobile phones and tablet computing devices.

Kinect 2 Architecture: Investigating more natural way to navigate 3D models.

The aim here was more modest, but was to create a parametric construction into which could be fed an image, from which the output would be a vector file that could be fed into a laser or plasma cutter. The parametric workflow would overlay a grid on the image that would be the basis of the cut. At each point on the grid the greyscale of  the pixel would be converted into a scaled circle. Thus creating a ‘punched’ effect and producing holes in the panels of varying size that produce a light/dark effect similar to the image (Fig 1).

Fig 1: JPG image 'sliced' panels

As it turns out this required more computing power than my laptop has, so the image had to be ‘sliced’ into panel. Each panel was then fed into a constructed grasshopper parametric workflow in turn (Fig 2).

Fig 2: Grasshopper parametric workflow

This produced a series of vector file output that could be cut into any material and assembled (Fig 3).

Fig 3: Vector cut files

First cut from water colour paper. To test legibility:

First Laser Cut

First Laser Cut