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Folio Wendy Chang 104007089
Architectural Communication
Wendy Chang (104007089)
Published by Swinburne University of Technology, School of Design, 2023.
Printed in Melbourne by Wendy Chang.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by means, electronic or mechanical, including photography, recording or any other information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from Swinburne University of Technology.
Declaration of Originality
Unless specifically referenced in the bibliography, the mark and all other material in this book is the original creation of the author.
Copyright Agreement
I agree for Swinburne University to use my project in this book for noncommercial purposes including: promoting the activities of the university or students: internal educational or administrative purposes: entry into appropriate awards, competitions papers; use in research papers or conference presentations as student examples of co-design projects and other related non-commercial activities: as an example for future students on line and face to face and in lectures. In some situations, this may involve repurposing the work to meet the requirement of Swinburne’s use.
I agree to grant to Swinburne a worldwide, non-exclusive, irrevocable and freeof-fee license to use this project produced in ARC30003 in any way for noncommercial purposes.
Signed Wendy Chang Date 26 / 03 / 2023
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iii Contents Part A: Ideation Introduction 2 Scenario 3 References 4 Experimentation 5 Part B: Design Design concept 8 Design precedents 9 - 10 Developing the design 11 - 20 Detailing the Design 21 Situating the Design 22 - 24 Attaching the Design 25 Part C: Communication Designing the posters 26 Reflective practice 27 Part D: Conclusions Conclusion 28 List of figures 29 Bibliography 30 Appendices 31
Part A: Ideation
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Introduction
Project 1 explores a mythological character; it converts an essential moment of their life, which has been told as a myth, into a system using two of the three mechanical systems, Skin, bone and muscle.
For my exploration, I picked the Olympian goddess Athena, considered one of the most powerful Greek gods, almost as equal to Zeus, her father and the king of all Greek gods.
Greek gods had “Epithets”, meaning roles, but no other god had as many as the goddess Athena.
For my research, I concentrated on the myth of the founding of Athens, a competition between Athena and Poseidon, who was Zeus’ brother, Athena’s uncle. Through this myth, it shows one of the attributes Athena was well known for wisdom; her gift of an Olive tree was of great value to the people of Athens, resulting in declaring her the winner.
Athena was Known as a mighty, strong warrior and a protector; therefore, I concentrated on designing a system that would depict this characteristic by using the skin and muscle system.
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Chang, Wendy. (2023).Athena the wise one, Midjourney generated image, [keywords: Powerful Athena planting olive tree].
Scenario Allegory
ATHENA – The Founding Myth of Athens…..
Before Athen became a city, two powerful Greek gods, Athena and Poseidon, battled its destiny. A fierce competition judged by the twelve Olympian gods took place to determine who would have complete control over Athen. The two contestants met at the hill of the Acropolis to show their powers witnessed by all the people of Athen, the Greek gods and Zeus.
Poseidon struck his mighty trident on the hard rock of the Acropolis, causing the birth of an underground sea and releasing a saltwater spring.
Athena planted a tree that immediately grew its full size and was adorned with plentiful fruits with high nutritional values and several uses. The tree’s high-quality timber made Athena’s gift superior, declaring Athena the winner.
Athena founded Athen naming the city after herself and becoming its protector.
The founding Myth of Athens sends a message not to be deceived by appearance; it reflects the power of womanhood and wisdom as Athena defeated the strong, mighty Poseidon with a gift that appeared insignificant compared to his. It depicts her as a powerful warrior.
The origami-shaped flower re-tells this Myth. The centre of the flower represents Athena. When the flower-shaped origami is close, it means the beginning of its blooming and depicting Athena as a robust and powerful god. As it expands, it shows Athena embracing the whole of Athen, protecting it. The velocity of its rotation symbolises Athena as a warrior, strong and courageous.
Reflection
ChatGPT is a handy tool. However, it is only sometimes accurate; the founding myth of Athens narrative was not precisely, compared to other sources such as Greek city times or Study.com; therefore, when creating the Scenario, I only used the information from ChatGPT that matched other sources. The most challenging aspect of poster one was creating the allegory, as it was difficult to summarise and obtain the story’s moral.
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“Myth of Athena founding city of Athen” (paraphrase from OpenAI’s ChatGPT AI language model, personal communication, March 01,2023)
References
Reflection
Producing content in Midjourney was a new experience that opened the door to a foreign concept for me. To see that each word I wrote created an image that using traditional methods could take days to finalised made me aware of how technology has advanced. Using AI technology in Architecture can reduce the time it takes to produce a design or concept and have significant input in parametric methods. The amount of information you can obtain with a click of a button will take weeks to collect using traditional methods. By combining parametric design and AI, architects can develop that unthinkable geometry. However, AI can assist an architect with engineering by providing information stored as data but is incapable of understanding or assisting with the emotional aspect of a design. A crucial factor in the design process is the feeling/emotion the architect wishes to convey through its design which will reflect the needs of their clients as individuals
Poster Experimentation
Experiment 1
Final Poster
Experiment 2
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Chang, Wendy. (2023).Athena Diagram, Midjourney generated image, [keywords: Olive tree Athena diagram].
Chang, Wendy. (2023). Athena and Athen, Midjourney generated image, [keywords: Athena Greek goddess, Athen Olive tree].
Chang, Wendy. (2023).Poweful Athena, Midjourney generated image, [keywords: Powerful Athena planting Olive tree].
Chang, Wendy. (2023).Poweful Athena, Midjourney generated image, [keywords: Powerful Athena white background].
- - --MIDJOURNEY- -MIDJOURNEYTWELVEGREE GODS IMAGE BIRT OFTHEOLI EFLOWER 01-IMAGE OLI FLOWERBLOOMING MIDJOURNEY MIDJOURNEY MIDJOURNEY OLIVETREE 0 MIDJOURNEY MIDJOURNEY TWELVEGREEKGO OLIVEFLOWERBLOOMING VISUAL REFERENCES ATHENA
Experimentation
Digital - Skin - Flasher Origami
Experiment one - Difficult to fold due to paper weight of 200GSM, broke easily.
Experiment two - was easy to fold, however the flower was too tall and narrow.
size
Pulley System oneThis system fails as the Skin component only open when it was next to the wheels component.
Experiment three, easy to fold and the right height and width to represent Athena’s allegory.
Steps to draw flower flasher Origami.
Pulley System twoThis system was a success as the Skin component open in the middle of the pulley system. The vertical component gave the skin system stability.
Exploded Axonometric
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1 3 2 6 5 4
Digital - Muscle Experimenta-
3D Printing
experimentation.
Experimentation
Physical - Skin - Flasher Origami
Pulley system 2 no vertival component
Pulley system 2 with vertical component---
Pulley system 2 testing
Experimenting with paper and shapes
Final Skin Prrototype
3D Printing Experimentation
Experimenting with Pulley system 1
Final Prototype
Pulley system 2 Sequence
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Part B: Design
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Design concept
The concept of the proposed installation is to reflect Athena’s characteristics. Athena, the protector goddess of Athens, a wise and strong warrior. Athena valued nature and considered it indispensable for survival. Athena is represented as a flower that from a delicate nature with soft, fragile petals transforms into a robust and sharp flower that spans its petals protecting the people of Athens. The rotation of the flower represents Athena as a fearless and strong warrior.
This installation will be in the Royal Botanical Garden near the Terrace Café, depicting Athena, the warrior and Athens’s protector. The installation will be composed of different size flower shape elements, representing Athena as the bigger flower in the middle of the installation protecting all the people of Athens been the smaller flowers.
The shape of the composition was to create a protective barrier for its visitors from the water element, reinforcing Athena as a warrior and protector.
The flower shape composition will rotate by a motor hidden away inside the base, and the controller of its base can adjust the rotation speed.
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Design precedents
Precedent 1
Precedent 2
Monument Archaelogy of Desire
Marc Quinn’s Monument Archaeology of Desire was inspired by the “Phalaenopsis, a genus of the orchid family”. This art piece was made of painted bronze, making it appear paper-like and lightweight structure. The sculpture was designed to reflect every aspect of reality, giving the illusion of a real orchid. This composition is part of Quinn’s exploration of the concept “of ideal beauty” achieved through genetic modification.
Spring Garden Installation:
This installation is composed of 30,000 flowers which are suspended in MidAir. The artist of this installation is Rebecca Louise, who is known for creating flower installations worldwide, from New York’s Time Square to the Onassis Culture Centre in Athens. Her creations are supposed to convey a message of the spring season’s splendour or diversity and show the contrast between organic and man-made beauty.
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Design precedents
Precedent 3
Flower-Like Mesh Installation of Zhengzhou Metro.
This installation by Mask Architects is position in the line-7 rail transit which serves the north-south axis of Zhengzhou. The Architects wanted to create a social space within the station where the commuters could have a space where they could interact with the environment and surroundings. This installation is composed of petals which form a canopy, with lights position within its leaves, which interacts with light, music, and movement.
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Developing the design - Sketches
To explore and design an Installation that would reflect the allegory of Athena, the Warrior, wise and protector of Athens, I started sketching ideas to deliver this message. Firstly, I started exploring shapes and whether to position them on the ceiling or ground.
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Developing the design
The initial exploration was to create a structure I could hang from the ceiling. However, I decided to attach the system from the ground to give the viewer a feeling that Athena was one with the people of Athens and that she could embrace and protect them all.
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Developing the design
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Developing the design - Digital
To develop the design, I started exploring the shape of a conventional flower; I isolated a petal and started to transform it into a more structural shape that would still reflect its original form but would relay the message of strength instead of fragility.
The next step was to explore variations that would best fit and convey the message in the intended Installation.
Variation 1:
This configuration explores an initial shape to represent Athena, the mighty warrior, as a protector of the people of Athens and explores its rotation movement to represent Athena, the warrior.
Variation 2:
This configuration combines variations one and transforms the shape to resemble a flower.
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Developing the design
Variation 3:
This configuration changes to a circular shape to explore the rotation movement further, which represents Athena as Powerful
Variation 4:
This configuration combines variations three and four to enhance the flower shape and rotation movement.
Variation 5:
This configuration multiplies petals to allow the Installation to have a better functionality both in rotation and appearance.
Variation 6:
This configuration combines variations five and six changing its shape to a Robust structured shape representing Athena, the wise, strong warrior, making its centre wider to allow for the rotation mechanism to be placed.
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Developing the design
Variation 7:
This configuration changes the middle element to a smaller circumference to facilitate it to be positioned in the middle of the base, which will house the details and mechanical aspects of the structure.
Model 1 Exploration:
This design explores having a flat base attached to the ground and a wider middle element to place the mechanical aspect. This design would make it difficult to achieve the rotation element of the Installation.
Model 2 Exploration:
This design explores having a circular base where the details and mechanical aspects of the structure will be located and positioning the flower element on the top of the base within an incision in the middle of the base, which facilitates its rotation element.
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Developing the design - 3D Exploration
Script
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Grasshopper
Developing the design - 3D Exploration
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Developing the design - 3D Exploration
Prototype 1 :
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Developing the design - 3D Exploration
Prototype 2 :
Reflection:
Through the design process I learned the limitations and problems that can occur in the different variations, how to limit material waste and how to alter the design to achieve desire outcome.
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Detailing the Design
Attachment:
The base of the installation has been designed to be the element that will attach it to the ground by placing a peg into the plate in the base. It will also house the mechanical element.
Motor and Speed Controller to be connected to each other and USB to allow for rotation.
130 mm
3D printing middle element to be glued to acetone petals to form a flower shape.
160 mm 50 mm
flower shape to be inserted in the middle of the base in the circle insition to allow for rotation.
180 mm
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Situating the Design
When considering a site for the Installation, I study several locations within the Royal Botanical Garden. This Garden was chosen as the intend was to create an organic Installation that would compliment its surroundings.
This area is in front of the Ian Potter Foundation Children’s Garden; initially, I thought it had potential as the installation could be fun for young visitors; however, being at the back would mean it would not be easily visible.
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Situating the Design
The second option I considered was the entry of the Education Centre of the Shrine of Remembrance along the concrete balustrading. I thought it could bring colour and happiness to the space. However, this space was eliminated as it felt it would not honour what the shrine of remembrance symbolizes.
This option is near the Terrace Cafe, which has a wide flat space and is near water, which were qualities I was looking for. However, if the installation were placed in a large open space, it would lose meaning and give a feeling of insignificance.
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Situating the Design
This location was chosen; it is next to the Terrace Café, which attracts various audiences. It is a smaller space, meaning that the Installation would be clearly visible, and its shape complimented the intended purpose of the installation.
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Attaching the Design
The design will be attached to the ground by placing two pegs through the plates n the model’s base directly to the floor.
These renders demonstrate how the Installation will be positioned in the chosen space and how it creates a feeling of protection for the viewer to align with Athena’s allegory.
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