VICTOR LUDESIGN STUDIO AIRTHE UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE

S E M E S T E R 2 2 0 1 5

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PART B CRITERIA DESIGN

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PART B CRITERIA DESIGN

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B.1 RESEARCH FIELD

“Strips and Folding” is an interesting research field of the algorithmic technique. It aims to

transform a single surface into a volume. In this succession of transformation, the continuity of the material is always emphasized.

In the book The Fold: Leibniz and The Baroque by Deleuze, it discussed that the importance of fold-ing technique which applied on Baroque archi-tecture. Deleuze states that folding is an endlessly producing operative. 1 Also, he emphasized points of inflection, elastic points and transformations play the important roles significantly in Baroque architecture. The time pasted, it is quite interesting to see this technique is still utilized and empha-sized in architecture nowadays even through the designing tools are completely digitalized.

Indeed, it is computational technology that leads the manipulation and application of these tech-niques to become much easier than what prede-cessors did.

Based on folding and strips techniques, the volume could be altered both internally and externally. This extends more room for designers. Besides, the method to realize fold are various, such as parallel, intersecting and overlapping. Those varieties give more aesthetic value to architecture. Moreover, strips and folding brings a economical fabrication to design. For example, in some cases, the facades becomes the structure itself due to application of this technique. There-fore, the utilization of material gets maximized.

STRIPS AND FOLDING

Figure 1

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B. 2. CASE STUDY 1.0Species 1

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SELECTION CRITERIA

1. AESTHETICS

2. THE ABILITY OF APPLICATION ON ARCHITECTURE

3. CONSTRUCTABILITY

This iteration reminds me a fountain, so I could say it has certain aesthetics and ability of ap-

plication. Whereas, in terms of constructibilty, it is not easy to build out as what it exactly looks like (with curved lines). However, those lines could be the pattern on a certain material.

Besides, a fountain, I think this form could be enlarged into a light tower or a parvillion because it has shetter structure and downward surfaces.

This iteration was selected out is most due to its aesthetics. It looks like a blooming flower, which

surprised me very much when I got it. As seen, most of iteration I got look very “2D” but this one give me a very strong “3D”feeling.

In terms of ability of application, this form could be use as a lager scale public architecture such as opera house, stadium and something else. It not necessarily need to be build exactly same but this iteration gives designers some inspiration to find a form.

The first thing of the reason why this iteration was selected out is aesthetics. This iteration deliv-

ers a very beautiful, intricate, and symmetrical pattern, which could be used as a decorative elements in some architecture.

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The first thing of the reason why this iteration was selected out is aesthetics. This iteration deliv-

ers a very beautiful, intricate, and symmetrical pattern, which could be used as a decorative elements in some architecture.

This iteration is very much closed to what the original pavilion looks like. However, the radiuses of the circles at the top are

much bigger than original one. This structure reminds me an airport terminal.

Recently, the proposal of Beijing New Airport has been released out, which designed by Zaha Hadid. The new terminal looks a little similar to this iteration but it do not have such openings at the top. Those openings at the top of roof could be the skylights for the terminal, which will help the architecture to achieve higher stainability level. Therefore, I think this iteration is quite suc-cessful in aesthetics, ability of application and constructability.

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B.2CASE STUDY 2.0DOUBLE AGENT WHITEDouble Agent White by Marc Fornes is a won-

derful case for my case study 2.0 even though it is only a prototypical architecture.

It combines nine intersecting spheres together to create a shelter space to clients as a pavilion. It is achieving a maximum degree of morphological freedom with a minimized amount of compo-nents.

In terms of fabrication, the object oriented com-puting designing generates the developable parts of double curved surfaces, which provides a strong material rigidity to the project. Also, the projects was resolved into numbers of double curved surface in order to achieve structural con-tinuity, visual interplay and logistical efficiency.

Most importantly, this project is highlighted be-cause of its double agent system-- two parallel but divergent sets of distributed agents describe the surface condition. And also the project had two sets: the first is a controlled macro set that generates the overall geometry with the mini-mum number of elements. The second involves a much more expressive set of higher resolution and morphologies that crafts aperture as ornaments. At this step, I think the architects utilized other software than Grasshopper. Overall, those two sets inform each other simultaneously, following the logic of assembly mobility. 2

Figure 2

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Step 1 Draw some random points as centres of spheres.

Step 2 Generate spheres based on the points and then adjust the location of points in order to find the best form of spheres combi-nation.

Step 3 Making the union of each single sphere and meshing spheres’ surface (triangulating) in order to prepare the easy fabri-cation.

Step 8 Unroll all triangular mesh surfaces and join some of them into one piece due to the pattern, and then fabricate them out.

Step 9 Assemble them on site. In this case, designers used the pin as connec-tion components.

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Step 4 Picking up the edges of each triangular mesh.

Step 5 Culling pattern base on triangular meshes and generate the patterns on them.

Step 6 Re-mesh the spherical objects with hollow pattern.

Step 9 Assemble them on site. In this case, designers used the pin as connec-tion components.

Step 10 Completed.

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B.4. TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT

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This iteration was selected out because it has very different method to generate the pattern

on the surface. The combination of spheres were divided into series of points, and then connected with circles. This gave me a brand new perspec-tive to generate the pattern on these compli-cated mesh surface.

Due to this method, this iteration could be easily fabricated with same way totally.

I think this iteration is most successful one, at least personal this is my favorite.

First, the hollow areas on each surface are so large that make this combination look like a net.

Second, those hollow areas could be the opening of an architecture in the future application.

Third, those regular patterns make the fabrica-tion much easier and also it will reduce the time people spend on assembling.

This one was selected out because the similarity of the original project, although it is not totally

same as the original one. The original project used some structural analysis software of plug-in to generated the pattern which is quite compli-cated to me at this stage. However, this iteration rebuild it at least by same process.

In the future using, this object could be a pavilion, a small hub, even a sculpture.

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B.5. TECHNIQUE: PROTOTYPES

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ASSEMBLY METHODS

Adhesive Edges

In the prototype stage, I have two plan to fab-ricate the combination of spheres. First plan is

to unroll all pieces and print them on paper and cut down to assemble. Considering to the weak durability of paper, this plan was nearly aban-doned initially. However, through this fabrication process, I found it is quite difficult to control every piece paper has same curvature, hence Plan B, 3D printing.

For 3D printing, all spheres were unwaved into smaller piece units. In order to assembly them

together, I firstly tried use PVA glue to make adhe-sion with each two. However, due to the resolu-tion of the 3D printer, the connection edges were too smooth to be glued. Also, due to the material of the 3D printing, it is not able to work well with PVA glue. Therefore, this plan failed.

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ASSEMBLY METHODS

Mortise and tenon joint

Plan B for assembling is to create a pair of mor-tise and tenon joints in both sides of the two

neighboring pieces. However, the 3D priter could not fabricate such tiny thing accurately. In the next stage, I will try another fabrication method in order to find more ways to assemble it.

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PART B.6.TECHNIQUE: PROPOSAL

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pH Level: 7.8

Water Quality Index: 7.0 Good

pH Level: 9

Water Quality Index: 0.3 Very Poor 4

Merri Creek Yarra RiverEastern FWY

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Merri Creek is a branch of Yarra River, but it not as clean as Yarra River. Except the obvi-

ous clarity of water, people are not quite aware of the difference between Merri Creek and Yarra River in terms of water quality.

According to Merri Creek Management Commu-nity, Merri Creek is polluted by heavy metal ion, which caused by factories upstream. 3 The indus-trial sewage increases the alkalinity of Merri Creek whereas Yarra River still remain a acceptable pH level, which around 7.5-8.5. As an indicator of water quality, pH level is quite important, but it is not obvious to ordinary people.

There is a big visitor activity area surrounds the intersection of Merri Creek and Yarra River. There is a observation platform of Dights Fall, BBQ park and a walking bridge, also there is a walking ramp from Eastern Free Highway, which leads a lots of people to the site. My site was selected here in order to let more people to see my proj-ect, which reflects the difference of water quality visually to visitors.

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If the water gets polluted, the surface tension of water will become larger. 5 Due to this, we often could see there are some bubbles on the polluted river. This form was hired to my project in order to indicates the fact which Merri Creek is polluted

right now visually. And also the color changes of the surface of project, which is associated with pH level of water, will remind people rethink the water we drink, the environment we live, the way we manufacture the products.

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B.7 LEARNING OBJECTIVES

AND OUTCOMES

Part B is most hard part in this subject so far, but it gave me brand new idea of the computa-

tional design. I once thought that the designing done by Grasshopper were all computational re-sult, people only played a role as“selector”during this process. However, I changed my mind now. Especially, through the reverse engineering of Case Study 2.0, I have noticed that the computa-tional design still need designer to have a clear idea about the destination , goal and even imagi-nation of final result, then use the Grasshopper or other digital tool to achieve it. This point refreshed my mind completely.

Beside, during the reverse engineering, I found there is not only one way to build a same work or projects. There are so many methods and ways to realize same target. In my reverse engineering, I got three different ways to do it. First one is using Metaball and Kangroo as two key command. This one takes long time to compute and the mesh it produced is not quit smooth. Second plan is using VB script to generate the spherical mesh directly,

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B.7 LEARNING OBJECTIVES

AND OUTCOMES

it takes a short time and offers a easy way, but due to some bug in VB script, for some certain data input, the script will failed . Also, VB script is quite hard to write properly. Last one is only using Grasshopper its own basic definitions. This plan takes a long time to connect each tag properly and make them work, but everything is under control compared with VB script plan. However, to make the union of each single sphere together, it is not easy to make them to create a smooth and continuous surface. Therefore, each plan has it own advantage and disadvantage. This thing was not in my consideration about Grasshopper.

Lastly, I want to mention a little about interim pre-sentation. I got a brand new idea for my project for next step. They were very interesting and excit-ing. I will redo the prototype stage, and do more experiments about materiality to achieve my goal of project--let the spheres flow on the river and indicate the pH level of the water to educate people to be aware of water pollution.

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B.8 Appendix Algorithmic Sketches

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B.8 Appendix Algorithmic Sketches

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B.8 Appendix References

1.Deleuze, G. 1993. "The Fold: Leibniz and The Baroque": 1-6

2. Fornes, M. 2012. Double Agent White <http://www.evolo.us/architecture/dou-ble-agent-white-in-series-of-prototypical-architectures-theverymany/>[accessed on 11th September 2015]

3. Merri Creek Management, 2015 < http://www.mcmc.org.au/> [accessed on 20th September 2015]

4. Cleaner Yarra & Bay, 2015 < http://www.cleaneryarrabay.vic.gov.au/report-card/yarra/yamer0195> [accessed on 22th September 2015]

5.Han, Minghan and Jin, Yong, 2005. Green Project: Theory and Application.

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B.8 Appendix Figures table

Figure 1 Loop 3http://www.arch2o.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Arch2O-Loop_3-Co-de-

iT-13.jpg

Figure 2http://strabic.fr/IMG/jpg/DSC_0475.jpg

Figure 3, 4 &5http://www.evolo.us/architecture/double-agent-white-in-series-of-prototypical-

architectures-theverymany/