Augmented Reality Trials

Bellow are three video’s of separate augmented reality tests I made as steps towards my final project, the Augmented Reality Temple – or my ‘House of Voidals’ utilizing my jailbroken Nexus 4 and the smartphone Aurasma app. The aims were to project larger object which would convey an immersion into a digital architectural space, moving from projecting elements from panels on a wall, to attempting to show a room and a corridor. The results are rough, but do suggest how smart devices could be used, in the near future when the hardware capability of the devices has improved  to project architectures into a world where the synthesis between man and machine is inevitable.
The Music Used in the Video’s is from Luke Abbot’s Holkham Drones and Modern Highway EP’s

Sequence 01 2 7 from Mark Simpson on Vimeo.

Sequence 01 2 8 from Mark Simpson on Vimeo.

Sequence 01 2 9 from Mark Simpson on Vimeo.

Free Resources For Rendering

It is getting towards the end of year which means producing the final visuals. Every year this means searching for images of people, trees, vehicles and other objects and then tediously cutting them out in photoshop.

Below is a collection of blogs that offer these resources free of charge. Hope this list is helpful and please click on the images to follow the link to the original page and thank the people who have helped to create these resources.

Skalgubbar: This is a great collection of people doing a range of activities. Click on each person and then save image as to download a png.

Vyonx/Gobotree: Vyonx used to offer a wide range of free cut out people and trees. These resources have now moved to their new project called Gobotree.com which requires a registration to download but is still free to use. A very large selection of people, trees and reference images/textures.

xoio offers cut out people and textures in packages to download as a zip file. Usefully, the people are photographed from a variety of angles allowing easy placement into architectural scenes.

Final Crit – Thursday 16th May

It was DS10′s Final crit yesterday which concludes our BRIEF03:TEMPLE. Wonderful day with a wide spectrum of temples showing the concerns and fascinations of a group of twenty-one architectural students in 2013. A myriad of political and spiritual statements on today’s society helped by parametric design tools and physical modelling. Here is the list of all the themes that emerged in the third term:

• Temple to Love and Lust in Brighton, U.K. – by Georgia-Rose Collard-Watson
• Temple to Revolution in Tahrir Square, Egypt – by Luka Kreze
• Temple to Making in the City of London, U.K. – by Michael Clarke
• Temple to Vibrations on Mount Neru, Tanzania – by Dhiren Pattel
• Temple to Crowdfunding the City of London, U.K. – by Sarah Shuttleworth
• Temple to Infinity in the Mojave Desert, U.S.A – by Andrei Jippa
• Temple to Augmented Reality near Oxford Street, London, U.K. – by Mark Simpson
• Temple to Gin, near Kings Cross, London, U.K. – by George Guest
• Temple to Permaculture, in Totness, U.K. – by Philp Hurrel
• Temple to Bees, in the Olympic Park, London, U.K. – by Jake Alsop
• Temple against Electro-Magnetic Radiations, in Snowdonia National Park, U.K. – by Chris Ingram
• Temple against Pre-Packaged Meat, in Smithfield Market, London, U.K. – by Alex Woolgar
• Temple to Bio-Polymers , in Thelford, U.K. – by Marilu Valente
• Temple against Consumerism, in Selfridges, London, U.K. – by Jessica Beagleman
• Temple to Online Knowledge, in the Sillicon Roundabour, London, U.K. – by Tim Clare
• Temple to the Awareness of Death, in Mexico – by Thanasis Korras
• Temple of Illusion, in South Bank, London, U.K.- by Daniel Dodds
• Temple to Water on the Thames, London, U.K. – by William Garforth-Bless
• Temple to Atheism in Lower Lea Valley Park, London, U.K. – by Emma Whitehead
• Temple to Light in Elephant and Castle, London, U.K. – by Josh Haywood
• Temple to Sun Worship in the Wyndham Council Estate, Camberwell London, U.K. – by Natasha Coutts

Thank you very much to all our external critiques: William Firebrace, Jeanne Sillett, Harri Lewis and Jack Munro.  Two weeks more to go until the hand-in of portfolios (28th May). Here are couple pictures:

Luka Kreze’s thorned tensegrity architecture against dictatorship on Tahrir Square – A manual to start a revolution.

Jake Alsop’s wax-generated temple for Bees

Chris Ingram’s Slate Community, away from electro-magnetic radiation

Marilu Valente’s Digital/Physical experiement on elastic bio-polymer

Marilu Valente’s diagramming of the bio-polymer stretch

Emma’s ‘Agora’ – forum for Sunday assembly – atheist congregation

Sarah Shuttleworth’s Temple to crowdfunding – Kickstarter HQ

Crowdfunded structure for Sarah Shuttleworth’s roof

Jessica Beagleman’s “Atelier” on the roof of Selfridges is made of sewed pieces of plywood/

William Garforth-Bless’Temple to Water using a thin fiber glass shell and floating components on the Thames

Philip Hurrell’s Temple to the Transition Movement in Totness, Devon

Daniel Dodds’ abstract for the Temple of Illustion

Tim Clare’s temple to online knowledge is an irregular gridshell following learning spaces

The story of a reciprocal structure and a temple to making by Michael Clarke

Updates on Burning Man

Toby and I are happy to introduce our engineers for the Burning Man projects: Harri Lewis and Stephen Melville from Ramboll Computational Design (RCD). We had our first meeting this morning (with Georgia and Thanasis) in our DS10 studio. Couple updates:

We are working on the best construction sequence for the two projects as well as the structural analysis diagrams (defining the size and amount of ground anchors) to receive the first part of the Burning Man grant. We will start booking our plane tickets very soon, DS10 people please make sure to confirm your attendance!!

The Fractal Cult (abstract) will have a thicker sub-structure which will transfer the loads of the cantilevers all the way down to a solid base anchored to the ground. The junctions could be similar to the Trada pavillion by RCD with hinges as well as notches.

For Shipwreck (abstract)we are exploring two options: Sectioning the hull with planar timber sheets or using a series of smaller members that would be laminated directly on fixed “ribs”.

More info very soon.

Harri Lewis and Stephen Melville in the DS10 studio showing an option for the Shipwreck’s curved beams (model by Philip Hurrel).

Stephen Melville and Harri Lewis from Ramboll RCD.

Shipwreck by Georgia-Rose Collard-Watson, the “ribs” holding the strips.

Work in Progress!

Work in Progress!

Couple projects from Ramboll Computational Design:

Trada Pavilion RCD Ramboll

KREOD by Pavilion Architecture is a reciprocal timber gridshell (with RCD and Evolute)

Belvedere Tree (a DJ booth for Chromeo in NY)

Belvedere Tree in action with Chromeo:

Stephen Melville presenting the Astana Presidential Library facade rationalization  (with BIG)

Biohacking

We have personal computing, why not personal biotech? That’s the question biologist Ellen Jorgensen and her colleagues asked themselves before opening Genspace, a nonprofit DIYbio lab in Brooklyn devoted to citizen science, where amateurs can go and tinker with biotechnology. Genspace offers a long list of fun, creative and practical uses for DIYbio.

25/04/13 Tutorials

We are back from a month long break. Great tutorial last Thursday. Students are developping their temples which range from a temple to infinity all the way to aa temple for bees. Here are couple pictures of the work. Beautiful!

William Garforth Bless’ ceramics tests for his temple for Water

Andrei Jippa’s Temple to infinity VB.net script to intersect meshes.

Marilu Valente is creating a temple to the bio-economy using a mix of potato starch based bio-plastic and plaster.

Marilu finding new ways to use her bio-plastic in a wall component.

Mike’s new reciprocal structure prototype, here is aa small paper model of it.

Jessica Beagleman’s Selfridges pop-up roof structure made of tied plywood components.

Chris ingram’s slate temple

The Regent Street Windows Project 2013

A big THANK YOU to all the DS10 students (past and present) that helped installing the MAGIC GARDEN for the Regent Street Windows project 2013 at the Karen Millen store!

>> You can now vote online on the Building Design blog for your favourite window.

>> You can also vote on Facebook

Here are some pictures of the installation night:

Arthur Mamou-Mani sitting with Jack Munro Discussing the Karen Millen Project photo by AgneseSanvito

The first part of the Karen Millen installation by Mamou-Mani Photo by AgneseSanvito

“The Shell” One of my favourite part of the project at the very end of Prince’s Street.

Jessica Beagleman, Andrei Jippa, Saraj Shuttleworth and Savvas Havatzias helping to set-up “the sky”

Andrei Jippa, Michael Clarke, Christopher Mount, Jack Munro, Jacob Alsop setting up the main “gate” at the Karen Millen Store

Andrei Jippa stuck in a strange fabric animal