petebooth[iaac]

Erik and I have finished our parametricLamp project for the parametric_design_one seminar.

You can download the entire presentation here. (working now)

Erik and I have completed our week 4 intrim crit.

You can download the PDF file here.

What is it that makes us who we are? What are the non-physical capabilities and traits that make us all unique from one-another? How can these specific skills be measured? Most importantly, how can these non-tangible aspects be represented in a physical condition?
In order to represent a human brain abstractly, our proposal considers four aspects of an individual brain: cognition (logic and memory), motor skills (hand-eye co-ordination), visual (visual memory and association) and audio (sound memory and association). A series of 3 tests in each of the 4 areas will be conducted to assess an individuals capabilities and traits.

The unique data will be used to drive a parametric model based upon each individual. As the data is abstract, the possibility for abstract physical representation is possible. For this reason, our physical object could be anything; a desk, a chair, a jacket, a pen or a building. This proposal represents the abstract data as a lamp, uniquely formed and constructed to a persons test results.

In an ideal world the test would be quite long, and widely varied, in order to assess each person more closely and create a lamp that is more finely tuned to the abilities. The lamps parameters will be driven by a combination of the test results; the corner heights of each skill box will be varied to create a unique form for each. The perforation pattern will be directly related to the physical size of each side of the 4 boxes, providing 17 different lighting diffusing screens for the lamp.

The finished product will combine a mixture of opaque semi-opaque plastic folded forms, wrapped around the internal light tube which will be situated on solid MDF or plywood base.

As a part of the 2006 Salone Satellite in Milan, Fluid Forms exhibited their new parametric lamp. A web interface has been created allowing customers individual control over 3 parameters, in addition to material selection.

While the web interface is a little bland, they had a much better example of the lamps parametric interaction capabilities through the use of a punching bag. Within the punching bag, pictured below, are a series of sensors that detect impact, which transmit in recorded information to a computer. Potential customers are provided with a pair of boxing gloves and asked to ‘design with their fists’ until they reach a form that they are happy with.

The impact of their blows are shown via a projection screen, providing a real-time display of their piece of design. A prototype of the lamp is on display in the image above, with this particular demonstration being constructed from a translucent plastic based material (exact details unknown).

You can view a fantastic video of potential owers of the lamp designing their own on this webpage.

You can see the all data that was collected previously in its entirety in the graph matrix below.

I have changed the configuration of the representation, it now shows only data that I collected regarding the individual date of birth, broken into the following categories:
- Year of birth
- Month of birth
- Date of birth
- Day of birth (number as part of the whole year)

The data that I collected concerned date of birth. Each student was asked to provide their birth details, which were then converted into the precise day number of the year that they were born, taking into consideration leap year calculations. From the data it was established that there are lot of people born around the beginning of September, meaning that they are all new year’s babies!

Two methods of parametric testing were applied, allowing the data to be visualized in different ways, both with different levels of user input possible. See the full resolution PDF file for the finer details. It is hoped that this data and will begin to be tested with the associative CAD software that IaaC uses, TopSolid.

download the full resolution PDF file here

Trek are a USA based bicycle company, specializing primarily in the production and sale of road bikes. Their Project One service offers the complete customization of their road bikes and also spans across into their mountain and tandem products.

In principal, bike customization is nothing new. Anyone can purchase individual components and build a bicycle of their own. Trek, however, offer this service in it’s entirety, from frame and paint scheme through to specific component specification and frame personalization. On top of this, the final product is factory built and delivered to the customers door.

The first set of options allows you to choose the specific frame type and size to suit your riding style and requirements.

The paint finishes is first specified by a overall scheme.

Each scheme has a wide variety of colours that are able to be specified in almost any combination.

Individual component specification is required for everything from the wheels and breaks, through to the seat post and water bottle cage.

Your name can be added to the paint finish, along with the logos of bike related charities that you may way to sponsor.

After you have finished customizing your bike the interface provides you with a full break-down of your selections, a final price and purchase options.

Although the interface and product provides a high level of customization based upon standard parts, one very important aspect has been overlooked. Every individual rider is different and the Project One only allows for selection of standard size frames. Intrinsic differences in human proportions means that that two people who who are 180cm tall will have different arm lengths, meaning that a custom frame size may be required. There are obviously adjustments that can be made in the components; seat height, stem length and crank length to name a few, but a fitted frame would be much more precise.

Fully fitted frames are in the realm of professional racers, and are a expensive and time consuming product to design and manufacture. I would expect that the profit margins and market demand are too small for Trek to offer a service such as this to the general public.

After 11 days in Tassie and a whole lot of flying I’m back in Barcelona, ready to take on the new year and the new semester.

We received our class allocations today and i got almost all the ones that i wanted which is great. So for the next 8 weeks or so I will be studying the following:

Research Studio - Digital Techtonics
Seminar 1 - Internet zero
Seminar 2 - Parametric Design
Seminar 3 - Scripting (rhinoscript)
Seminar 4 - Complex Systems