FINAL LIBRARY

Patkau Architects present: JELLYFISH: A tribute on Second Life

After a lot of pain and suffering using Sculptypaint, I have finally managed to create a small tribute in our Library's garden/viewing area dedicated to the Patkau Architects and their "Jellyfish" plywood shell creations.

Another screenshot, bear with me.

A view from the outside of our Library. The building is complete but my team members and I are currently adding small details like more furniture and particle systems.

Scratch for Second Life.

Here is a helpful link to download Scratch for Second Life, a programme that writes scripts so that you can create more depth and interaction within your designs:
http://web.mit.edu/~eric_r/Public/S4SL/

This is the subsequent tutorial, which is definitely worth a read as it highlights all key points and is easy to understand for all those who are new to Second Life:
http://web.mit.edu/~eric_r/Public/S4SL/tutorial/index.html

Alpha channels.

A screenshot of the Alpha channel I made in Photoshop implemented within my design. Once saved as a Targa file, it can be uploaded to Second Life for L$10 and used as a texture.

Particle success

Made a fountain with the aid of particles, I highly recommend visiting the Particle Laboratory in Second Life and just exploring and seeing the different particles available. Once again, it is really helpful to follow Torley on youtube for informative, easy to understand videos on how to use the various aspects of Second Life.

To make a screen.

I began with applying a texture on a flat, square prim that was reminiscent of white noise on a television.
Then I applied the following script in order to animate it to show movement on the screen:
default
{
state_entry()
{
llSetTextureAnim(ANIM_ON | LOOP | SMOOTH | ROTATE, ALL_SIDES,
1, 1, 1, 1, -0.025);
}
}
Layer this on top of a another flat prim (as your monitor) and add buttons wherever you would like in order to increase authenticity.

Our original blueprint

This is the original plan that my team members and I planned out, allocated specific areas where we would incorporate our findings from our journals whilst keeping our Library cohesive.

In pursuit of a interesting and captivating floor-like texture.

In order to find a new and different floor-like texture, I went around my house looking for interesting surfaces to photograph, which I could then manipulate in Photoshop.

Here are the photos I have taken, a description of the original surface and the "after" photo after the manipulation in Photoshop.

MY SCHOOL BAG:

PAINTED SPLATTERS:

KNITTED BEANIE:

Folds, Blobs and Boxes in Architecture

"Folds, Blobs, and Boxes: Architecture in the Digital Era" 
2001-02-03 until 2001-05-27 Carnegie Museum of Art 
Pittsburgh, PA, USA 

Over the past decade, software originally created for other purposes--from designing animation to sneakers--has altered contemporary architecture and opened up possibilities unthinkable in the pre-digital era. Folds, Blobs, and Boxes: Architecture in the Digital Era, on view at Carnegie Museum of Art's Heinz Architectural Center from February 3 through May 27, 2001, explores the impact of this software on architectural design.

Joseph Rosa, curator of architecture at the Heinz Architectural Center, organized the exhibition. In just over a decade, we've seen the practice of architecture completely revamped by this new design software, he said. I doubt if architects will ever completely abandon the craft of drawing by hand, but because architects have digital capabilities, we now have a range of architectural shapes that were impractical before the computer.

At a glance, digitally generated architecture looks different. Digitally designed forms, unlike traditional rectilinear architecture, often have smooth exteriors and shapes found in nature--design possibilities made easier with computer software.

A few architects in the pre-digital era anticipated the shape of today's sleek and supple buildings, but for the most part, designing and building these structures became possible only when architects began designing with computers. Today, computer software helps architects envision and depict their ideas, control and simplify complex calculations, and test alternatives. In fact, the digital realm can administer, unify, and streamline the architectural process from conceptualization to construction. To a great extent, computers have made many of today's large, truly innovative architectural projects--buildable.

Folds, Blobs, and Boxes presents a variety of computer-generated drawings and CD-ROMs, as well as three-dimensional models, and features works by a number of today's leading architectural firms, including Preston Scott Cohen, dECOi, Peter D. Eisenman, Frank O. Gehry, Kolatan/MacDonald, Greg Lynn, Reiser + Umemoto, Stamberg Aferiat Architecture, Joel Sanders, and Bernard Tschumi. (Peter D. Eisenman and Bernard Tschumi--are among the five finalists chosen to submit plans for the expansion of the Carnegie Science Center on Pittsburgh's North Shore, to be completed in 2005. Reiser + Umemoto and Stamberg Aferiat Architecture were finalists in the recently completed Pittsburgh Children's Museum competition.)

Folds, Blobs, and Boxes begins with a look at twentieth-century projects by R. Buckminster Fuller, Frederick J. Kiesler, and Claude Parent, whose pre-digital-era work continues to influence and inspire today's architects. These men created revolutionary designs, but their achievements owe more to the innovative use of new materials and alternative building techniques than to new design technologies. The new materials they used included aluminum and poured concrete, which permitted the building of sinuous and curved forms. In other cases, predigital designers relied on alternative construction methods to realize their ideas. R. Buckminster Fuller's Dymaxion Car (1933), for example, was created with marine construction techniques and built in a shipbuilding factory in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

Original Article can be found here: http://www.absolutearts.com/artsnews/2001/02/03/28039.html

Spotlight on Architects

Toyo Ito: "a Japanese Architect known for creating conceptual architecture, in which he seeks to simultaneously express the physical and virtual worlds. He is a leading exponent of architecture that addresses the contemporary notion of a "simulated" city, and has been called "one of the world's most innovative and influential architects."





Mikimoto, Ginza, Tokyo, Japan, 2005

Cameron Sinclair: "is the co-founder and 'chief eternal optimist' (CEO) for Architecture for Humanity, a charitable organization which seeks architectural solutions to humanitarian crisis and brings professional design services to communities in need."



Zaha Hadid: "is a London-based Architectural Designer, whose work encompasses all fields of design, ranging from urban scale through to products, interiors and furniture. Central to her concerns is a simultaneous engagement in practice, teaching and research, in the pursuit of an uncompromising commitment to modernism."





Nuragic and Contemporany Art Museum, Cagliari, Italy

An update on the progress on Second Life.

Our library is nearly complete, at this point we are merely adding small details to the colour scheme and changing small, aesthetic details.

We have incorporates our three journals together, my Victorian/Romantine style, Charlotte's Industrial style and Joyce's exploration of Japanese Architecture have all been fitted around a basic blueprint of a modern Library, thereby reinforcing a cohesive element within the design but still retaining our individual journal preferences.

Continuing work

In the reception area of my library, it's coming along. I choose a dark coloured scheme to reflect the sombre mood of the memorial dedicated to the 4 victims of the 16th Street Baptist church bombing, which I have researched as part of my journal.

Wallace A. Rayfield

Reading through one of my journals (Preservation) I stumbled upon an interesting article on Wallace A. Rayfield, the second african american architect in America, whose plans, drawings, elevations etc were discovered in the basement of a Southern Baptist Minister when he was cleaning out his home

Here's a helpful link:
http://www.uapress.ua.edu/product/Architectural-Legacy-of-Wallace-A-Rayfield,4922.aspx

Something about this story seems quite enticing. My idea is to mainly incorporate this specific article into my SecondLife project, by exploring Romanesque and Byzantine styles that were dominant in the design of Rayfield's buildings, as well as literally incorporating aspects of this story, such as the hidden box discovered by Allen Durough and possibly a memorial to the four girls who died in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church, one of Rayfield's most famous buildings.




16th Street Baptist Church, the site of the bombings.

Experiments on CAD

A perspective view of a Treehouse I made, my first experiment I've ever done on CAD and I have to say I really love the programme, it's easy to use and quite fun

Sculptypaint and flowers

Experimenting with Sculptypaint, the first programme I used to help me to understand sculpties, the only thing I made that I really like was this bizarre looking flower which cost me L$20 to upload, oh well, such is life.

Here is a link to download Sculptypaint:
http://elout.home.xs4all.nl/sculptpaint/





HOWEVER, I highly recommend first browsing Torley's channel on youtube, as it is full of helpful advice to those who (like me) are new to second life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEAM1GCzk74

Progress on Second Life

Slowly getting the hang of using Second Life, my group and I have roughly plotted out a library (as you can see, garish colours amuse us.) However with future refinements I see this looking quite good!

Patkau Architects present: JELLYFISH

After reading one of my previously posted journals (easily located in my del.icious account if you're curious) I came across Patkau Architects, who are one of five winners of the Warming Huts v.2011 “Art and Architecture Competition on Ice in Winnipeg.


Seriously, read this article:


http://www.riverroadcommunications.com/2011/02/winnipeg%E2%80%99s-architectural-art-show-on-ice/


And because the article lacks a nice photo, I've been kind enough to provide one for you:

Apparently these are plywood shells, I love the shapes, they're abstract yet still seem to have a defined form... Here's hoping experimenting on Second Life will produce similar results!

Offset filters, Alpha channels, oh my.

Doing some experiments for Media, figuring out how to use alpha channels on Photoshop, which is something I never knew about!

Making an offset filter, manipulating light with a nice blue colour I made (if you're interested the "code" for this particularly fetching blue is 290992)

Messing about with Alpha channels, making a mesh/bulstrade? I thought it might look quite modern

The final product, or at least the product I liked the most, the brainchild of the previous two images, I'm hoping to incorporate it into a design on Second Life!