Shaping Light

As I have not really experimented with light and shadow before,  I was interested in how different shapes could wash surfaces and bounce light.  My first shadow panel was based off a panel system I have been working with in my studio.  I used tapered pieces to create a patten that moves back and forth in a random way. My second shadow panel was based off the the first panel, however instead of using tapered pieces I used curved pieces.  As these two panels had large gaps where light could easy move through for my third panel I used a herringbone pattern that had small slits on the the tip of the triangle.

When experimenting with each of the panels I found that the third panel only worked well when it was using backlighting as it would softly wash the surface below it.  The first two panels created a similar effect with their shadows, however I found that the light that washed over the surface seemed more profound on the curved surface rather then on the rigid tapered surface.

Using a 9-bulb LED bicycle light produces interesting effects on a backdrop wall as the distance from the light source to aperture changes.  In this case, what starts as the expected shadow of the chair on the wall (perforated with round holes) inverts the round voids of the chair into shadows as the flashlight is brought closer to the chair.

I found the second sample most interesting, and would like to investigate levels of translucency.  I think layering has a lot of potential in creating different types of shadows, which is where I will further develop my investigations.

Here are some early explorations from our first day of class. Some of these effects were created using a light shining into a translucent cylinder of paper. Different colored lights, different materials, and different objects were used to get various effects. Others were from an object with a patterned opening and multiple light sources.

This video is a collection of some clips from further explorations using the paper cylinder and a view through a piece of polycarbonate.

My own personal interest lies in the use of patterned light and its interaction with textured surfaces. I would like to further explore the use of patterned openings and textured “canvases” for the patterns to move across. Light gives depth and greater dynamism to texture and the movement of light throughout the day allows the surface to change character and become an animated surface rather than be too static.

During Finals Week I went to the SmartGeometry Workshop

Get an in-depth introduction about graduate studies in architecture by coming to Grad Day at the UO Architecture Department’s Portland branch.

In Portland, University of Oregon connects Architecture students to professionals who are pioneering Eco-Districts, green buildings and design process innovation.  Students can be immersed in sustainable communities where urban agriculture, composting, public transit and bicycling are the norm.  They can work with national leaders in shaping how cutting edge-standards like the Living Building Challenge and Passive House can be applied to real-world situations.  Instruction is at an advanced level as students arrive with basic architectural training completed at our main Eugene campus or other colleges or universities.

For those who are eager to change the world, our program gives the the concepts, examples and contacts to make it happen, in a supportive hands-on atmosphere.  We invite potential graduate students to learn more about us in a special Grad Day open-house on Nov. 4, 2011 where we provide an in-depth introduction to the M.Arch. programs.  Students will have the opportunity to learn about the curriculum, interact with faculty and students, then inspect design projects and facilities.  The core activities occur 10:00am-2:30pm with lunch provided, additional touring and social opportunities follow.  See draft schedule.

RSVP to Kirsten Poulsen-House

Univ. of Oregon students setup final presentations at the Yale Union Contemporary Art Center. Brian Schmidt presents to Mark Perepelitza, Lin Sealy, Craig Davis & Tobin Weaver. Audrey Snyder presents to Robert Liberty, William Robert Taylor in foreground. Photos by Suenn Ho

Today, I gave a brief tribute to our graduating M.Arch. and B.Arch. students.  Teachers and students alike are relieved to see the great results of their efforts. (Final projects will be posted on my studio’s blog , lighting projects are buried in the online spool.) Here is my advice for the students…

Starting a new project mean facing a blank sheet of paper.  Placing the first mark sets up what else can happen, as every mark drawn changes what the designer sees.  Through building up these marks, the designer creates a world of possibilities.

In school, teachers guide this mark-making through design challenges of increasing complexity. By the final year, our architecture students help define the inquiry. They decide what matters, where the first mark goes.  Upstairs, we can see you did a great job in filling those blank sheets of paper.

At graduation, you are given a big new sheet of paper, the mother of all blank pieces of paper.

To fill this paper, look around you.  Paul Polak, who Designs for the Other 90%, says architects and designers just need to Ask.  Every community knows its problems.  By asking, he found the need for water in third world countries and invented by low-cost irrigation and filtration systems.  If you can find a problem and a means to address it, then you can create yourself a job.  Even better, a meaningful question can drive a series of projects in which you build expertise to share.

So to fill the new sheet of paper, look to your community.  This circle of family and friends can be a well-spring for creative challenges.  AND they can provide a wealth of collaborative expertise.  Your ideal partner loves to do what you hate to do. Through partnering, you can leverage your vision.

In this networked world, your success depends on the success of others.  A friend of mine says, you succeed by making your boss look good.  So today, you have succeeded by making your teachers and your parents look good.  We are basking in the reflected glory of your success.

From Feb. 4, 2011…..I feel very lucky to have been involved with Cohort V of the Inter/National Coalition for Electronic Portfolio Research.  The organizers have tuned cultivating a research community to a T.  They set up the organizational framework to maximize getting a serious commitment from all participants.  Each team had to submit a proposal that promised that the school would promise to send a representative to workshops twice a year for three years and put money up front for workshop expenses.  Each year they launch a new cohort with representatives from 7 to 10 schools, with the more experienced ones providing research findings, areas for further inquiry and sundry advice.

The leaders guide those new to the specialization through a serious research methods bootcamp, consisting of expert presentations and large group discussions interspersed with relevant individual and small group exercises.  The leaders social-engineer the small groups so that participants first get to know a wide sampling of peers through round-robin encounters.  Pairs of teams are given time to develop closer relationships through intense brainstorming and feedback sessions.   Teams are guided in defining and refining their research question, finding relevant precedent research, approaching data collection and analysis, identifying relevant resources, allies and dissemination outlets.  Required to plan a schedule of deliverables, each team a private consultations with a coalition leader between meetings.  The check-ins help keep progress moving and provide a natural support base.

While we focus on pedagogical research to improve teaching and learning, we also get many useful ideas about effectively implementing technology in higher-education.  Cohort members have shared tips about orchestrating change in complex organizations, and specifying, selecting and implementing specific types of eportfolio technologies.

As many of our colleagues have encountered big roadblocks due to funding crises, changes in leadership and staffing, organizational inertia or politics, poor technology partners, we feel relatively lucky to have muddled along without a big disaster.

While we felt guilty about not following a linear path in our research, we realized that gradually refining the research question through iterative efforts fit our professional practices.  Just as in Design, in Action Research, the question is emergent rather than pre-determined.  We can’t really determine the most relevant Yes or No until we get to know the territory.  We began with a larger area of inquiry and gradually narrowed our inquiry to “Can we help students create meaning from curricular and co-curricular experiences through digital reflection?”   As we moved from specification to implementation, we discovered and refined our interest.

We felt a little inept because we weren’t doing much counting. But at the final meeting we heard that the richness of qualitative methods were more robustly informative, interesting, and relevant to implementation since quantitative studies are so intrinsically bound to a specific context.

The lesson for the weekend is that Context matters. Keynote speaker of the VT Higher Education Pedagogy symposium, Carolin Kreber explained that quantitative studies tell what worked in one location at one time, not what will work universally.  As our UO research partners come from Business, Arts Administration and Architecture, we have been constantly struggling to find commonalities across disciplines as well as to understand the uniqueness of each curricular situation and what combination of pedagogy and technology best suits it.

For our final INCEPR presentation, I concentrated on how words and graphics can complement each other in learning about architectural design.  Words can help focus concepts while allowing the form to be fluid.  Graphics and spatial models can organize complexity, but can lead to functional fixedness.  Since the creative process depends on re-reading new possibilities, it is fostered by the open-ended quality of writing and messy sketches.

We can steer design students by being cognizant how words and images can be useful at different stages of the Kolb Learning Cycle.  For example:

1. Concrete experience – On-site sensory reconnaissance

2. Reflective Observation – Site documentation – drawing & writing

3. Abstract Conceptualization – Analytical site diagrams

4. Active Experimentation – Scheming through design sketches & sketch models:  iterative attempts to understand what works and doesn’t work

Designers use analytical diagrams for Abstract Conceptualization and parti diagrams, sketch models and sketches for Active Experimentation.  Both graphics and text are important for design eportfolios.  Words help focus intention while allowing formal flexibility and subtlety.  Graphics can provide  organizational frameworks for information.  We need text because geometry can create functional fixedness – no ambiguity for rich reinterpretation.

My next steps include more in depth study of literature on reflection in eportfolios (Darren Cambridge’s book, Kemper’s scale of reflection, Cohort literature) and getting help on meaningful data collection and interpretation. I still feel like a novice at educational theory and have plenty to learn about both qualitative and quantitative research methods.   Perhaps Helen Barrett or Jonathon Richter could help our team with an approach for interpreting the piles of interviews, surveys and portfolio analyses that we have generated.