Kolarevic's "Architecture in the Digital Age: Design and Manufacturing"

Today I read and reflected on the weekly reading by Kolarvic. (2003)

NURBS - PARAMETICS - DYNAMIC & FIELDS OF FORCES - DATASCAPES - METAMOPHASIS - PERFOMATIVE ARCHITECTURE

KOLAREVIC, B. 2003. Introduction. In Architecture in the Digital Age: Design and Manufacturing, ed. B. Kolarevic, 13-28. New York: Spon Press.

Kolarevic speaks about the changes in the conceptualization of architectural forms over the centuries due to advancements in technology in a mind-opening way. Today, digital technology is not only being used as a representational tool but as a way to derive the form, generating design outcomes based on algorithms and "the chosen generative computational method." This means that the age-old method of intuitive freehand drawing and an emotive response to the site and its users is replaced with a matrix style set of outcomes. As an emerging Architect this is exciting but poses a few questions at the same time. Will buildings lose their soul?

(Image1: Diagrams of Parameters, Kolarevic page 17)

"The parametric description of forms (parametrics) provides a particularly versatile way to represent complex curves and surfaces. Sets of equations are used to express certain quantities as explicit functions of a number of variables, i.e. parameters, which can be independent or dependent." (Kolarevi, p17)

(Image2: Diagrams of Waterloo Station, Kolarevic page 19)

It was really interesting to read about the design of the International Terminal at Waterloo station, where architect, Greg Lynn, uses 'force' and 'motion' to evolve a form with animation software. The result is a fluid structure.

"Lynn utilizes an entire repertoire of motion-based modeling techniques, such as keyframe animation, forward and inverse kinematics, dynamics (force fields), and particle emission." (Kolarevic, p19)