Studio Day 2 - January 15

Following the summer traveling seminar presentations, we started in the BET Lab with the second DP demo.  Today was review of 2D sketches and intro to surfaces and solids.  There were some great questions that reminded me to talk about topology and geometric strategies for the development of the modeling.  We covered a few possibilities for making a slider bar that might constrain a range.  I think this has the group thinking about possible graphic interfaces for their design work.

Following the demo I met with everyone in three small groups to discuss their case study projects, the information that was found, and possible approaches to developing the project.  Different buildings obviously have different agendas and formal approaches so there will be a good range of rules.  I imagine at the completion of the first project we will have a whole population of rules that everyone will be able to mix, match and mate to create difference among their proposals.  We also talked about not only formal rules developed by the architect but rules that might have to do with structure, elevators, or egress.  We talked about the work being digital and therefore inherently malleable and to extend that imagining how they might manipulate their project and how it will be response not to scalar changes by changes that reflect embedded no-linear rules.  One example would be egress.  This can be driven by both geometry and quantity of occupants.  Stretching the floor plate will increase the number of occupants but additional egress is only required at 50 people, and 500 people.  The distance (depending on occupancy type) limits the maximum distance to 200feet.  These two factors will drive the size and location of egress.

Over the weekend the studio will be developing initial diagrams and models.  Some more complex interaction will only be possible once we get into more depth of DP while other aspects can be modeled already.  I imagine (or hope) that everyone has something they can model now and something that can build on their ever increasing software knowledge.