Silhouettes

I have a feeling that I am going to be turning weekend photography trips to London into a thing.

I popped up yesterday with a specific theme in mind, to challenge myself, and to try and improve upon my usual “find an interesting geometric arrangement in a photo”. With that in mind, I sought to discover how the architecture of buildings is reflected in their silhouettes, especially in an urban/street context. This is partly because I do sometimes wonder whether we as architectural practitioners think about the effects of shadow aesthetics on the street setting, other than in a simple “rights of light” legality.

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Whats next?

I’ve not been able to prevent myself from drawing comparisons with the period of unemployment that I experienced as a university dropout, with the period of unemployment I am now experiencing as a M.Arch graduate. The former isn’t something I tend to speak of at length these days as it was bundled up with a bunch of other concerns that quite frankly are not the majority of people’s business. Why would I compare the two then? I was originally due to give a talk on my experiences as a student at Edinburgh (and subsequent life), so one thing led to another and I started to go down that particular rabbit hole, and here we are.

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Tutorial 03 Part 3 - Rendered Landscape

In this third and final tutorial of this series, we look at using topographic mapping data, point cloud terrain data and building massing data from the Digimap service to generate a rendered isometric landscape. In addition, we also incorporate the woodland generation script from the prior tutorial to provide an aesthetically useful method for rendering a low-poly woodland.

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Tutorial 03 Part 2 - Woodland Generation

In this tutorial, we will look at woodland generation using a recursive generator, the galapagos solver and the kangaroo physics plugin. The purpose behind this method is to provide a means for someone to generate a low-poly randomised woodland without resorting to using proprietary (and costly) 'CADBlocks' found through services such as VRay or Enscape.

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Tutorial 03 Part 1 - Isometric Contour Cube

This is the first of three tutorials that will cover ways to manipulate Ordnance Survey data using Rhino, Grasshopper & Illustrator to achieve a specific aesthetic outcome. In contrast to the prior tutorials I have uploaded, I have attempted to record these in such a way to act as a step-by-step guide for those who are interested. The later tutorials will incorporate VRay & Photoshop, as I explore additional options. Also, apologies for the typing + clicking sounds during the tutorial. I’ve used Audition to minimise them as much as possible, but I have a loud keyboard, and I need to get a better microphone setup.

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Oslo Revisited

Last week I travelled to Oslo for an extended break, and similarly to the previous visit in 2018, I was blessed with some sunny weather (but not too hot!). During this trip, I managed to squeeze in two guided tours, a trip outside Oslo to the Kistefos Museum, a visit to a couple of galleries/museums in Oslo, along with visiting new areas of Oslo itself. At this point, I would not say that I have “completed” Oslo, but I think I’d visit Bergen & Trondheim in the future if I wanted a city break in Norway. One thing I definitely noticed during the trip - I’m not sure whether its a result of post-academic fatigue or something else - but I found it far more of a struggle to get my photographer’s eye into gear, so the photos may be of a lower quality than I’ve come to expect of myself. Despite that, I have uploaded a handful to the Oslo photography page that I feel are good enough for highlighting.

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Tutorials

I have uploaded to YouTube the first two tutorials/walkthroughs I have been planning on recording, detailing workflows and methods I have used during my Master of Architecture studies. I hope they will be of use to other students and practitioners, and if anyone has any comments or requests, please leave a comment below the videos in question.

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