INSTRUCTOR: R. Bracket III
UA Pratt Institute School of Architecture

The advanced digital electives are a collection of diverse seminars exploring advanced 3d modeling and visualization techniques. The seminars are intended for students who showed proficiency in Arch 213, are interested in learning other software, and seek a deeper understanding of the advanced features offered in the various programs. The advanced electives introduce software through a series of technical tutorials and exercises that will rapidly enable students to work fluently within the given software. Individual project work allows students to customize their area of interest and move beyond technique into an in-depth exploration of digital form making. All faculty chosen to teach Arch 522c are encouraged to produce syllabi that complement their particular expertise and skill set. As such, students should take time to familiarize themselves with the specific instructors, and the software and agenda being pursued by each. In all sections students are required to produce both midterm and final modeling projects that attest to their mastery of the concepts and skills presented.

Synopsis

This seminar will introduce techniques of digital workflow that integrate software packages into the design process. We will treat the mouse as our pen, the screen as our paper, Maya as our tool, ready to be explored, questioned, probed, and dissected. I request that you employ a playful attitude towards design. Like the game of a young scientist, you must explore, test, and catalog the successes and failures of how you employ the tools of the software. The playfulness must not be timid, we must move beyond any fear, learn to leave the wavering line of the unknown. Digital tools provide a vast and often intimidating collection of options with no clear correct answer. From this we have the opportunity to develop our own unique set of skills; techniques for shaping the way we approach design, architecture, and a more dynamic way of understanding. The digital is an ever increasing presence in our contemporary environment; this presence will not diminish, but grow. We, as architects, can seize this new array or opportunities to change our field and its influence on contemporary society. Software primarily developed for the film and visualization industries has created a new playing field. A practice untested by hundreds of years of technique development and answers. There are only a few that go before us, paving but a few of the roads that may open to you as you expand your catalog of techniques. The road, however, is not paved by mindlessness, but by those well trained and versed in the techniques of architecture, art, science, mathematics. These disciplines are all reshaped into a digital space, and since the field of software aided design is still very young, we have the charge to test all mediums to best cultivate what tools we can use to refine our designs. The class with primarily focus on Autodesk Maya as the main design tool, but we will also incorporate packages such as Rhinoceros 3D, Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, Aftereffects, and any other tool we require. Students should leave this course with an even broader scope of questions than when they began, and a blurry sense of how they can continue the search for the never ending answers to those questions. The computer will play a part in their design methodology for the rest of their lives, and we will only advance as far as we are willing to explore. The knowledge gained from our playful indulgences provide the fuel for a more informed and precise discussion on the evolution of our field and the techniques that drive it.

Themes:

_Insects _Evolution _Cyborgs _Adaptation _Machine _Cinema _Tattoos _Mutation _Flesh _Dissection

Software:

_Autodesk Maya _Rhinoceros 3D _Illustrator _Photoshop _After Effects

Readings & Viewings:

Required:

_ Francis Bacon: The Logic of Sensation, Gilles Deleuze

Suggested:

_On Growth and Form, D’Arcy Thompson. _The Shape of Space, Jeffrey Weeks

_Difference and Repetition, Gilles Deleuze & Felix Guattari

_Videodrome _EXistenz _Dawn of the Dead _The Cell

_Ghost in the Shell _Alien…

Methods of Play:

This is meant to be an extremely participatory course. We will shift from lecture to lab to presentation as the need arises. Most classes will begin with a lecture, followed by either individual lab time & critique or a group session with presentation of projects. As your research develops we may categorize into species, forming teams to more quickly advance specific techniques. The class will inhabit three phases; an introductory growth phase with small tutorials for each class/topic; an intermediate development and differentiation phase that will define your final project; and a productions phase where you will find and represent your understanding of the digital design techniques presented in the course.