Inhabit 1 - Second Life

This project was one i certainly enjoyed a lot even with all the problems that come with technology. Sculpties are so so so annoying ><, stitching problems galore.

With our readings, the one about the students multimedia mapping of their trip to uni and the consequential overlapping of one project with another creating "happy accidents" is one that you have to experience.

In this project we analysed the Owen G Glen building. I was particularly drawn to the sparse terrace space, which in my research is termed "public" space. There wasn't much "public" using the space. The space was also vast, intimidating and also felt sacred and untouchable with its perfect piece of raised grass.

With my design I wanted to make the space for accommodating for use and also make it "touchable" to make people be the activating element to the space, for give them permission to reclaim that space as their own. To do that, I modified the grass element into rolling terrain in order to break the flatness of the site. Grass also has a less formal feel to it, to get the feeling of park space.

In Second Life we HAD to co-operate. No ifs or buts about it. Dian and Jeffrey ended up working in the terrace space also. By working together our designs started to rely on the other to really make it strong. My terrain reacted to the presence of their ideas, sloping up to create drop offs defining the path of Jeffrey's and cutting out off at Dian's. I wanted to place grass on top of Dian's also but once again - time is not my friend...

The presence of their ideas strengthened my design in the way of breaking the space up. It defined small intimate pause areas for people to sit on the slopes and study or relax to their wish. Jeffrey's design incorporated the need for movement of students which try to get to their lectures while also to bring attention to how people are using the plaza space currently and thus encouraging people to move out onto the grass to pause rather than using the space as just a short cut. Lastly Dian's structures which ripped up the ground, became seats on the edge of my grass or a sheltered interior space for rainy days making the space able to be used rain or shine.

In the end our designs became one space with a obvious goal to encourage people to inhabit the plaza space more and to encourage the integration of all which pass this space.

Thrashold

My Thrashold, was about breaking the barrier between the interior studio space and the exterior courtyard space. The courtyard in its original design was for outdoor project work like the bus shelter which resides there. It was become a space used for lunch and other activities which in itself adds to the culture of NICAI. I always thought it was a shame how our studio space is so walled off and isolated from this space and the only connection is a hidden door in a niche on the interior.

I thought of breaking the barrier between the courtyard and studio but also between the many levels representing the hierarchy of students and staff also. To do this I literally ripped open the building. Like a slice of cake I carved out one "familiar" studio bay and as a stack of tower blocks they come tumbling out of the building in the action the breaking down of this hierarchy and barrier.

The space where the section originally was is left void so the many levels of the building are joined and the heavily guarded studio is opened to the outside.

There are many parts of my design i wished i could of resolved further such as making the different modules left in the courtyard into inhabitable spaces with meaning or purpose and also the working out how the void in the building would work in real life..... torn open buildings with interiors exposed to the outside aren't very sort after.....i think.....

Trash Can

Heres my project for the "Trash can". the process (device) to generate 3d shapes from images of past projects.

Finished office!

From entrance way! which btw has a sliding door

textured moving! wall

Beautiful sun set

Teleport tablets they have floating text telling you where to go

LASTLY!!

From the front

From the back!

the last little bits always tend to take the longest

this little bit of snazzing took me SO LONG toooooooooo long! what i was trying to do was make the whole space less stagnant and more vibrant....well tht ended with opposing opacities walls on both sides of my office opaque vs transparent. Competiton

Getting up to date....

I have been looking into sculpties with this program suggested by a tutorial from youtube. Sculptypaint free program, i didnt get very far apart from some wild wild shapes and rounded cubes haha ><

Anyway developement of my office as you can see! some snazzy textures on the exterior! ..ok its not so great. The texture squares were much too big and bulky for my liking so i scratched it! I also found a texture rotating script which i applied to it as well with very dizzying result @.@

Moving along (feels like everything as done in no time at all!! completely not true = =....sleepy)....Upper stories.........................are completely blank..........lol except for one little thing..........TELEPORTATION bookself! little tablets connected to a few of my fellow archimates' offices it was very funny when trying them out lots of "where'd you come from!" lol

The top floors views from mid air were very spectacular!

Lastly i added some lighting around my office specially in places where 2 platforms had a little gap between then n above it the result. Im very happy with it, it has a warm and inviting ambience!

now that brings us right up to date! ^^ yay

In my sketch books initial though (3 lines which were literally __________-----, dotted lines were entrance and solid the "office" space.

This is what came to be.

I loved the red here though its very very bright...should darken it a little.......

it contrasts very very nicely with the stark white (competing)

Playing with furniture and my first Alpha channel made texture ^^ yaya!! tutorials come in very very handy. I do not particularly like the arrangement though the verticality of the panels are nice

Black on red is very pretty

Development phase! EXPANSION! yep it got larger! 2m wider and 4 m higher also put in a 2nd floor! I carried on the commercial idea using the same shape.

Office Design

Developing from the awkward circles I'm changing to cuboid shapes. From my journals since they are mostly about commercial buildings which tend to all look the same... the shape took form of cuboids (below) which are positioned in interlocking positions.

Adding in media texture onto the wall (monki-monkeyjungle ^^). I really liked the effect it had there. Coming straight in from the entrance it has lots of impact.

Course being beside the edge of the island i didnt want to block the view of the sunset so i kept the openness with large tansparent panels.

(noticed ive magically levitated into mid-air, it wasnt because i wanted to make it in the sky! it lagged SO much less up there) thats me experimenting with exhibition spaces for my journals. This resulted in the conclusion (melody's suggestion also) that my space was too small.

Office Location

I thought i should clarify WHY i chose this location for my office. SQM is a commercial property magazine. To me commercial relates to business and therefore money, profit and property value.

What shouts louder of property value than a great ocean view?

Office. Begin

After fiddling around with single prims i tried something more complex. Our assignment requires us to make offices so:

twisting prims were initially what i was curious about, how they were made and a little experimenting yielded some twisting poles from cylinder prims hollowed and cut.

I did some developing by adding my circular platforms and trying to section, like the "sliding" doors to a balcony, the interior felt constricted and uncomfortable so it didn't get up to the sliding part, and the addition of a upper floor to add space making it a "office".

After some development I quite like the idea of having different levels but them not actually being stories it lends itself well to the terrain as well making it easier also to make an entrance pathway. (note: someones huge block in the way)

Considering our constructions are in a virtual world not impacted by weather and where gravity can be turned off by a click of a button i really want to try use these aspects which are impossible in real life to their fullest and of course fulfilling basic requirements set for our offices too.

Teleportation shall most definitely be used :D

My Adventures in 2nd Life

Slowly feeling my way through Second Life at our tutorials, may I introduce my very first SL object:

Tada! ^^ my orb.

Used a twisted sphere with a water particle texture and yellow tint with red lighting effects.

It makes for a snazzy force field haha XD

Scripting: (oh joy)

Creating hovering text from 3greeneggs site (http://3greeneggs.com/autosript/).

It said: "click me to rez object"
it was an apple sculptie which rezzed my awesome orb XP.

The rezzing script required adding in the object as a second step. That took me looooong time to figure out but FINALLY got it after watching multiple tutorials haha!

3rd journal: The International Journal of Project Management

Lastly, The Internation Journal of Project Management.

Editor: J.Rodney Turner

It is published 8 times a year and provides information on many aspects of project management: techniques, practices, research etc. The journal also acts like a forum for readers to share experiences from a range of industries and technologies in all areas of project management. It has case studies too of the lates important issues!

E-resource:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/02637863

2nd journal: SQM

SQM:Colliers Internation Property Magazine

A magazine for professional property decision makers, the mag says. It's aim is inform and entertain readers about current news and views.
It is published quarterly.

This was also in our library though only the 2007 summer issue. There were lots about "investment", "project", "cost" etc.... though finding an article on China's property market was was an interesting read.

The Article told of a $4 billion project to build a whole new district on the Auckland harbour complete with malls accomodation and public spaces.

1st journal: AV Proyectus

AV Proyectos is a bilingual publication, in english and spanish. It is the third in a series of journals Arquitectura Viva and AV Monografías. It specially highlights in more detail the projects (developed and developing) that are mentioned in the latter two journals with special emphasis on contests and construction details.

Currently at 37 issues.

Website Address: http://www.arquitecturaviva.com/

I found the journal in our library n had a look through them and took a few snap shots. Lots of pretty images n short on text, though pictures are worth 1000 words no? The few words that were there.....spanish is hard to decode......

Particularly i was struck by the designs with exhibitionish qualities combined with intricate detailed facades. They make such stricking impact!

I loved the colours in this image the cream n light pink create such a warming ambience. The twisting positions of the boxes make for an interesting visual too.

First Post

Welcome people! first post of this blog~ have to say I'm not much of a blogger but I'll do my best ^^

ok so for Architecture Media we have to make an office in Second Life which educates and have references to 3 journals which we were allocated.

So.......

my journals are

1) The International Journal of Project Management

2) AV Proyectus

and......

3) SQM : Colliers International Property Magazine.

In next few post I'll go a little more indepth about each.