Monday, December 01. 2008Processing 1.0 Hits the WebProcessing 1.0! Legendary artists' software approaches the exalted state of being a no-kidding finished package. Processing.org. http://www.processing.org/ Today, on November 24, 2008, we launch the 1.0 version of the Processing software. Processing is a programming language, development environment, and online community that since 2001 has promoted software literacy within the visual arts. Initially created to serve as a software sketchbook and to teach fundamentals of computer programming within a visual context, Processing quickly developed into a tool for creating finished professional work as well. Processing is a free, open source alternative to proprietary software tools with expensive licenses, making it accessible to schools and individual students. Its open source status encourages the community participation and collaboration that is vital to Processing???s growth. Contributors share programs, contribute code, answer questions in the discussion forum, and build libraries to extend the possibilities of the software. The Processing community has written over seventy libraries to facilitate computer vision, data visualization, music, networking, and electronics. ----- Related Links:Wednesday, November 19. 2008Emergence Project: Representing a Textual Discourse
The generative data artwork uses simple morphological rules to animate word clusters, based on linguistic proximity, similarity, and difference. It deliberately utilizes computer-generated animation to chart how complex patterns arise out of a multiplicity of simple interactions, a phenomenon known as "emergence". ----- Via Visual Complexity. Personal comment: Cela rappelle certains projet de Ben Fry autour de l'analyse de textes. C'est déjà vu, sous une esthétique générative, mais reste intéressant au niveau de l'analyse de textes et dans ce cas précis, de discours. Voir aussi à ce propos un précédent post relatif aux élections américaines. Monday, November 03. 2008GEO GOO (info park) by JODIGEO GOO (info park) exhibition by JODI at iMAL. JODI explore notre représentation du monde à l'ère d'Internet et de Google. Des services tels Google Maps ont changé radicalement notre perception en transformant la Terre en une immence surface commerciale. En projetant les constructions géométriques de ces outils en ligne dans la réalité et inversément, en superposant leurs grilles de lectures et balises comme des chemins de jogging, le Parc Royal de Bruxelles devient le point de départ d'une dérive symbolique et mystérieuse dans un réseau d'associations amplificatrices et déconstructivistes traversant la capitale de l'Europe, la Belgique, l'espace des réseaux et des données. Depuis des siècles, la géométrie a été chargée de symbolisme, partant de l'objet mathématique pur jusqu'aux signes les plus ésotériques et mystiques, cachant dans des figures complexes des sens qui ne se révèlent qu'aux initiés, aux voyants ou aux explorateurs psychédéliques. Elle a très tôt investi le territoire, gravant ou traçant ses formes et lignes dans les villes, les architectures et monuments ou les champs de culture. Le Parc Royal de Bruxelles en est un exemple bien connu avec son triangle compas franc-maçon. JODI met en relation cette géométrie tracée depuis très longtemps sur la terre, et celle qu'aujourd'hui les humains posent sur la surface actuelle du territoire, celle qui se construit de l'Internet à travers Google Maps et Google Earth. L'oeuvre de JODI joue avec les processus de décodage et codage, de déchiffrage de contenus cryptiques sous une surface chaotique. Les messages cachés sont là, derrière le code dans lequel il faut rentrer pour qu'ils se révèlent. Dans GEOGOO (Info Park), tout est susceptible de construire sens, cela ne dépend que de vos capacités à déconstruire et reconstruire: les scintillements radiaux du rond soleil, les 3 platines rondes de DJ dans un triangle parfait à la disposition des visiteurs (attention au backmasking!), ou encore ce parcours fou de jogging entre les rond-points de Bruxelles. Et si vous ne pouvez reconfigurer, il suffit de contempler, c'est juste rondement beau. Related Links:
Posted by Christophe Guignard
in Interaction design, Territory
at
08:22
Defined tags for this entry: data, design (interactions), exhibitions, generative, globalization, interaction design, mapping, territory
Friday, October 24. 2008Spam ArchitectureThe images from the Spam Architecture series are generated by a computer program that accepts as input, junk email. Various patterns, keywords and rhythms found in the text are translated into three-dimensional modeling gestures. A project by Alex Dragulescu. Alex is a Romanian visual artist whose practice embraces both traditional and new media. His projects are experiments and explorations of algorithms, computational models, simulations and information visualizations that involve data derived from databases, spam emails, blogs and video game assets. Postspectacular / Generative sceneThere is an article about Postspectacular in the last Creative Review magazine. Karsten Schimdt and his colleagues car be labeled as "creative coders" or "generative designers" in the following of Lia, Dextro and all the Processing scene who's father would be John Maeda (design by numbers). On the other hand, you also find coders like former student Juerg Lehni, who's work goes through code, collaboration and design machines & tools. Note: the generative scene is much older in the architectural creative environment than in the visual one. With grand-fathers like Peter Eisenman and Daniel Libeskind, fathers like Greg Lynn or Asymptote (paper-less studio) and thousands of contemporary childs. This scene is now moving into digital fabrication (Roche DSV & Sie, Gramazio Kohler, etc.) See links below for the visual scene. Related Links:Tuesday, September 23. 2008Breeding Objects - Computational Design, from Digital Fabrication to Mass-Customization (C.STEM 2008)"Mass cutomization", le terme qui monte, qui monte. Ici mentionné dans le cadre d'une conférence à Turin relayée par Régine Debatty (WMMNA). -
Good old Turin is currently hosting the third edition of C.STEM. The theme this year is Breeding Objects - Computational Design: from Digital Fabrication to Mass-Customization and while the spotlight is still on generative systems, it is, in many respects, very different from the first edition. This time, the main protagonists are designers, not artists.
Although, i have taken the habit of running swiftly in the opposite direction when i hear the word 'design,' i have to admit that the programme this year is remarkable. Especially because it brings that innovative focus i had hoped to see more widely explored in the schedule of the Torino World Design Capital. C.STEM showcases projects anticipating future developments in design process and technologies. What happens when domains such as design, creative coding and digital fabrication meet the new scenarios of mass-customization?
The exhibition and conference explores the way design is currently re-considered and shaped through the lens of information society and, more generally, new technologies. The work of young designers today involves a crucial paradigm shift: not only do they use the digital tools provided to them but they also invent, modify and produce new instruments themselves.
Another important characteristic of the new design production involves digital fabrication processes such as laser cutting and 3D printing (a few examples in the posts Rapid Products 1 and 2). The impact of digital fabrication is far from marginal: instead of churning out identical products, objects are created which, while they undeniably belong to the same family, are all different from each other. Beyond the creative process and fabrication, the digital tools and new design processes have also the potential to radically modify the marketing of design products and the way consumers engage with the creation of objects. Two projects presented in the exhibition, Nervous Systems and Fluid Forms (see below), have already been launched on the market and as such, exemplify new business possibilities. C.STEM conference is over but you can still see the exhibition until September 27 inside an Ex Methodist Church. If i were you i'd run there, you don't see a show like that every year in this region.
Located in an ex-Methodist church in the center of Turin, the exhibition illustrates what is the state of the art of computational design through a series projects that range from everyday objects you can buy online to sweatshirts weaved with newsfeeds, and a 3D printing machine able to 'prints' most of its own components (not the original one but maybe even better, a version fatta in casa by ToDo design studio.) The list of projects exhibited is online. Here's just a selection:
Ebru Kurbak and Mahir Yavuz' NewsKnitter project comments on the manipulation by the media in Turkey. Live data streams of information are used as an unpredictable base for pattern generation. Web-based information is either gathered from the Turkish daily political news or according to a theme that pervades global news. The data is analyzed, filtered and converted into a unique visual pattern for a knitted sweater. The system consists of two different types of software: one receives the content from live feeds while the other converts it into visual patterns, a fully computerized flat knitting machine produces the final output. The pieces of clothing are not for sale right now but the designers are working on that.
The jewelry designed by Jessica Rosenkrantz and Jesse Louis-Rosenberg of Nervous System, on the other hand, is up for grab. The design is both heavily tech-mediated and inspired by organic forms. Using two custom-made computer applications --one mimics branching dendrites, and the other the movement of particles--the designers generate forms for bracelets, pendants, and earrings. The Radiolaria line, for example, is named after the plant cells whose structure was a source of inspiration for Buckminster Fuller. Jewelry from the Dendrite collection takes its cue from the aggregate growth of coral. The Dendrite algorithm both controls the aggregation and allows consumers to participate in the design process
Way more beautiful in real than on pictures, 1 of 1 design studio creates one-of-a-kind, made to order apparel. For The Tissue Collection, designer Cait Reas worked together with C.E.B. Reas. The artist generated the Tissue images by defining processes and translating them into images with code and software. Cait used a digital textile printing technique to apply the patterns to fabric.
In case you'd worried that this blog is turning into a geeky version of Harper's Bazaar, i'll have to mention that the best moment of C.STEM for me was to listen to Marc Fornes from theverymany. It's the second time i attend one of his talks and i'm still not sure i understand most of what he says but his work is so awesome that it doesn't really matter.
His presentation addressed failure. For example, he detailed how the Aperiodic_vertebrae structure that theverymany developed for Generator x - Beyond the Screen (a workshop and exhibition which highlighted the creative potential of digital fabrication and generative systems) in Berlin taught him that while computers facilitate many of the design processes much of the assembly still has to be done by hands. The Berlin version of the Aperiodic Tiling counted some 530 panels and nearly as many connecting components.
The core of theverymany approach is therefore to use computer to generate, not just many parts, but a logic between these parts. They applied the concept to the woven pedestrian bridge that Francois Roche from R&Sie is building on the boundaries of Poland and the Czech Republic. About the 2006 edition of C.STEM: C.STEM conference, Part 1 and Part 2. Related entry: Generator x - Beyond the Screen, a workshop and exhibition which highlighted the creative potential of digital fabrication and generative systems. Related Links:Personal comment: Pourrait-on parler, dans le cas de certain projets que fabric | ch a réalisé autour de la question de l'espace et de la globalité (ex. RealRoom(s)), de "global customization"?
Posted by Patrick Keller
in Design
at
13:16
Defined tags for this entry: architecture, design, design (environments), designers, exhibitions, generative
Tuesday, August 12. 2008Maps, Information design & architectureAt the end of last month, I attended the International Symposium on Electronic Arts (ISEA), that was held in Singapore. Although the juried exhibition of art works didn’t involve that many works on the themes of The Mobile City, the ISEA seminar had quite a few sessions on media technology and the experience of place and space. Unfortunately, there were so many parallel sessions, that I can’t pretend to come even close to a overall wrap-up of the conference. So I will just pinpoint some of the themes and works that I found interesting in a few posts in the next few days or so. If there was one trend that struck me at ISEA, it was probably the idea of data visualization as a way of making abstract or invisible cultural processes more tangible. It wasn’t only the topic of some of the artist presentations, but also the core of Lev Manovich’s inspiring closing talk. The idea is that now that we have more content and metadata than ever (Lev Manovich: this is not the era of ‘new media’ any longer, but rather the era of ‘more media’), interesting cultural forms are emerging from aggregating, analyzing and visualizing this data. Examples range from from simple tag clouds that tell us what people are talking about on the web to visualization of traffic flows in the city and systems that monitor epidemic outbreaks. In business these mappings of aggregated data are called ‘dashboards’. Lev Manovich pointed out that companies have had these dashboards for some time, but that the cultural sector is only now catching up. Right now, these mappings are becoming a new cultural form in themselves. Just look at websites like Visual Complexity , CultureVis, Infosthetics and Information Esthetics.
While all of this is interesting in itself, of course the more interesting question is how to go beyond mere ‘dashboarding’ and mapping of flows? How can we turn these display of statistics in interesting pieced of public art? And how will these maps influence our experience of both the city and our social relationships? Some examples of this trend that were shown or referred to at ISEA: Arch-OS was presented by Mike Philips. It is a system that can collects all sorts of data from a building, varying from movement in the building by analyzing the images of cctv camera’s and internet traffic on the LAN to climate data. These data streams can then be used to drive different architectural features, varying from visuals on LED screens to a giant wall sized robot that moves through the open space of an atrium. An ‘Operating System’ for contemporary architecture (Arch-OS, ’software for buildings’) has been developed to manifest the life of a building and provide artists, engineers and scientists with a unique environment for developing transdisciplinary work and new public art.
Paul Thomas showed his i-500 project, an art work that is part of a new building for Curtin University’s new Minerals and Chemistry Research and Education Buildings. It uses the Arch-Os to analyze the work of the scientists in the building and translates their activity into a public art work that is an integral part of the building. Working in close collaboration with Woods Bagot Architects, as part of the architects project team, the i-500 project team are creating a public artwork to be incorporated into the fabric of the complex with the intention to encourage building users to communicate and collaborate. The i-500 will perform a vital and integral role in the development of scientific research in the fields of nanochemistry (atomic microscopy and computer modeling), applied chemistry, environmental science, hydrometallurgy, biotechnology, and forensic science. The artworks potential is to represent the visualisation of quantitative scientific research as part of the architectural environment.
Chris Bowman and Teresa Leung are researching what looked like a ‘grammar of gps visualization systems’.
Cabspotting traces San Francisco’s taxi cabs as they travel throughout the Bay Area. The patterns traced by each cab create a living and always-changing map of city life. This map hints at economic, social, and cultural trends that are otherwise invisible. The Exploratorium has invited artists and researchers to use this information to reveal these “Invisible Dynamics.
Cascade on Wheels is a visualization project that intends to express the quantity of cars we live with in big cities nowadays. The data set we worked on is the daily average of cars passing by streets, over a year. In this case, a section of the Madrid city center, during 2006. The averages are grouped down into four categories of car types. Light vehicles, taxis, trucks, and buses.
The project aggregated data from cell phones (obtained using Telecom Italia’s innovative Lochness platform), buses and taxis in Rome to better understand urban dynamics in real time. By revealing the pulse of the city, the project aims to show how technology can help individuals make more informed decisions about their environment. Related Links:
Posted by Patrick Keller
in Architecture, Interaction design, Science & technology, Territory
at
09:01
Defined tags for this entry: architecture, conferences, data, design, generative, information, interaction design, interface, mapping, media, mobility, science & technology, software, territory, urbanism
Tuesday, July 29. 2008Faber Finds generative book coversBy Gavin on Creative Review 's blog - Faber Finds is a recently launched service offered by publisher Faber and Faber that utilises digital print technology and affordability to make out-of-print books available once more. Basically, a book is only printed when someone orders it - and, thanks to some clever generative programming by Universal Everything’s Karsten Schmidt (who was working for postspectacular.com at the time of commission), each cover printed promises to be totally unique. Various decorative elements designed by Marian Bantjes are arranged by the programme into a decorative border around the book’s title and author. The latter appear in a bespoke font, b-hmmnd, designed by Build’s Michael Place. The process may sound relatively straightforward when distilled like this but Karsten Schmidt has talked to cr about the complexities of the programming – from getting to grips with the rules and nature of the design elements to creating a generative solution which would introduce variations at certain points of its design process, manage and even aesthetically judge them automatically. As promised in the current issue, here is Schmidt’s full technical breakdown of the processes involved: A year ago Faber & Faber commissioned PostSpectacular to help with the design of a software system to generate complete & print ready book covers for their new imprint Faber Finds, an on-demand print service of out-of-print books. The challenge was more of a creative than a technical one, as the task given was to build a “design machine” which would be flexible enough to generate a very large (theoretically infinite) number of unique designs, one for each single book printed, within the agreed boundaries set by Faber’s art direction. Faber also commissioned Canadian typographer Marian Bantjes to create four designs used as templates for the desired look & feel of the borders styles of each of the different genres offered by the imprint (Fiction, Non-fiction, Arts and Children’s). Each of her design routes then needed to be abstracted, decomposed into smaller elements & shapes, parametrized and generally reverse engineered conceptually. Only once we understood all the rules and nature of the design elements used on all levels, we could start building a generative solution which would introduce variations at certain points of its design process, manage and judge them automatically. This initial part of the process included things like identifying the 5 levels of symmetry used in Marian’s sketches, experimenting with minimum and maximum border widths & densities, exploring individual symmetry limits per shape element, finding the right amounts of shape elements used per border quadrant, ensuring author names and titles (set in Michael C. Place’s beautiful B-HMMND font) are correctly word wrapped whilst not being obscured by the borders etc. In total we isolated over 35 of such rules and parameters… Generative design systems often work on the premise of extrapolating a given design idea/art direction. Because our aim was to create such a system (rather than a single one-off design), it was important to find the extreme cases and boundaries of expressions possible and then shaping them. Finding appropriate values to these design parameters required a phase of constant experimentation and conversations with Faber’s design team - these collaboratively agreed boundary values then became the encoded art direction within the software. Generating the borders was just one, if major, task of the final solution, though. Our custom software was developed in Processing (http://processing.org), Java and PHP and works as an internal webservice at Faber which receives new batch orders and then generates complete, print ready PDF files with all copy, branding, spine, ISBN, barcode and optional high-res JPG preview using the book details supplied. Generating a single cover only takes about 1 second, but due to its iterative and semi-random nature can sometime require hundreds of attempts until a “valid” design is created which is judged to be “on brand” by software itself. The project was art directed by Darren Wall at Faber and Faber. To see Karsten Schmidt’s own blogpost about this project, visit postspectacular.com/process/20080711_faberfindslaunch faber.co.uk/faberfinds
Related Links:
« previous page
(Page 5 of 5, totaling 48 entries)
|
fabric | rblgThis blog is the survey website of fabric | ch - studio for architecture, interaction and research. We curate and reblog articles, researches, writings, exhibitions and projects that we notice and find interesting during our everyday practice and readings. Most articles concern the intertwined fields of architecture, territory, art, interaction design, thinking and science. From time to time, we also publish documentation about our own work and research, immersed among these related resources and inspirations. This website is used by fabric | ch as archive, references and resources. It is shared with all those interested in the same topics as we are, in the hope that they will also find valuable references and content in it.
QuicksearchCategoriesCalendar
Syndicate This BlogArchivesBlog Administration |