Design experiments in architectural multimedia, drawings and animations and prototypes

My research practice includes drawings, animations (with sound), photography and small prototypes of communication pieces, some graphical analysis, and experiments focussed on provoking discourse in the symposium. Critical analysis of the concepts behind these practices and how they assist the research dissemination is part of architectural dialogue and development. Architectural animation through computer generated processes has established itself as a major practice method and has shown significant improvements due to computing and software advances since the 1970s. Anna Hougaard examines the idea of animation in relation to architectural drawings and architectural media such as models and renderings as part of her PhD. Hougaard has posted lectures on her architectural animation processes and develops the theoretical position of architectural representation developed by Robin Evans, which steps through various historic and diverse forms of architectural representation, categorising their role in architectural theory and practice. 

William Kentridge, whose stop-motion sketches form the backbone of his famous animated works, the hand sketch forms the commensurate link to Louis Kahn’s fascination with sketches and exposition of the boundless aspects of architecture as a way of order emerging from chaos. The animation is an architectural tool to assist interdisciplinary teams to visualise and discuss, even provoke ideas about time-based design as part of the process of collecting data for my research. Animation is a practice-based method of design and time in media. 

The tool extends the tradition of exploring AVs through animation with a criterion for assessment based on the quality of the data that emerges from the interdisciplinary discussion of the animations. The animations included in this website are related to research questions. The following four experiments will be discussed at the symposium after the presentation of the animations related to the specific research questions. The animation is a time-based exercise in design. The animation sequence is intentionally imperfect, and the negative appearance perhaps sets the scene in a darkened space in which clarity is sought.

ANIMATION 1 - The Vimana animation

Are CAREV systems currently limited by their hierarchical definitions, and does this fall below cultural and social expectations on the limitations on autonomy, safety, and communications?

This animation is about stimulating dialogue around the historical development of AVs. The re-imagined ancient Vimana is animated through stop motion technology. Seldom do the cultural and social implications of the long history of AV development through literature and film become a source of discussion. In this context, the Vimana is argued as a site of exploration of ideas. Industry and academic research, while aware of the historical nature of AVs conceptually, tend to gloss over historical cultural artefacts. 

Critically, industry and academic research turn to consultation with the community and stakeholders about their fears and aspirations of the technology, arguably not appreciating that social and cultural expectations surrounding AVs through literature and film have had an important impact on thought. 

ANIMATION 2 +3 – Ethics and synthetic intelligences and machine dependency

Research question: Do clear definitions of this technology assist in understanding the technology? 

Defining vehicle autonomy is an animation created to stimulate interdisciplinary discussion about the definitions of vehicle autonomy, AVs, CAREVs, driverless vehicles, synthetic intelligence, algorithms, and ethics. In this animation of Raphael’s Athens School which includes a depiction of the famous western European philosophers debating ethics, an Apple computer as a metaphor for synthetic intelligence is brought into the school and the philosophical discussion is changed forever. In the second part of the animation, a person attached to the life supporting ventilator is kept alive through artificial means, including monitoring of breathing utilising machine intelligence, this references Tomaso Marintetti’s Manifesto of Futurism. We are reminded of our dependency on machines.

ANIMATION 4 + 5 - Movement similarities

Research question: Can we intervene, and can we co-define an ecological framework in which technology is sustainable and positively influences the environment?

In this animation we are reminded that some of the movement systems of the natural world are similar to the created movement systems of a man-made vehicular transport road. This introduces the ideas put forward by Capra and Luisi that the Cartesian divide between the so-called natural world and man-made world do not in reality exist. Can we envisage a world in which all systems form part of a larger whole? In the second part of the animation, the artistic movements of the robots used by Mylene Farmer in her 2016 concerts and the Autostrad Port Botany cranes which appear to be choreographed in their movements are compared. 

ANIMATION 6 - CAREV communications and the city

Can we intervene and can we co-define an ecological framework in which technology is sustainable and positively influences the environment? That is, could it reverse current pollution levels and lead to improved public health and safety and reduced energy use, increasing the potential for environmental justice? Does a change in fleet allow for changes in the city fabric, its semiotics and communications, a systemic semiotic technoecology?

The animation suggests a smaller mobility option (CAREV) that is focussed on improved environmental outcomes, spatial changes to the public realm, and a novel communications unit. The animation opens up an opportunity to discuss the future of CAREVs as a mobility option and the design of smaller vehicles, which is an environmental, functional and mobility issue that is part of the research question, leading to answering another research question: What opportunities does the technology hold for spatial or social justice or injustice and which societies are affected? 

A fully CAREV environment will require a new communication and semiotic system to improve safety, because this will allow vehicles and the public to communicate and interact. The subject of the animation is the CAREV’s communications along with the CAREV’s interaction with humans in the city. 

ANIMATION 7 - The communications unit

Does a change in fleet allow for changes in the city fabric, its semiotics and communications, a semiotic technoecology?

The communications unit is an experiment with the specific purpose of advancing novel knowledge about communications between actors in the public realm. Initial analysis of human drivers and actors in the public realm revealed a considerable amount of passive and active communication. 

The CAREV communications unit looks back to the history of indicator lights; the first patent included the use of the human hand as a semaphore. The initial experiments explore this notion of hand gestures in signalling as a humanising element. The hands are displayed on the organic light emitting display (OLED) screen as a moving display. This also references the tassels on Aladdin’s magic carpet. Universal hand signals, created in consultation with an Auslan actor whose hands were covered in white hand-cream and filmed on a green-screen background, form the basis of experimental semaphores. 

My analysis of hand displays at an intersection between drivers and actors in the public realm resulted in a number of instructions such as LEFT, RIGHT, GO, STOP, THANK YOU, SLOW DOWN being required. The semaphores allow the CAREV to communicate its intentions to the actor in the public realm. The film display on the communications unit is a display of potential machine-to-human communications. The aim of this experimental study is to test the potential uses of such a communications unit for CAREVs to better understand semiotics in the public realm and to understand the aesthetics that may arise. 

The next step in this semiotic experiment was to simulate the visual outcomes in a local context, to better understand the visual changes as a result of CAREV communication displays on a broader scale. This could partly answer the research questions about the visual and semiotic qualities of the future CAREV environment, see Animation 8.

ANIMATION 8 - Animating the city with CAREV communications

This animation investigates the combined effects of a future connected autonomous renewable energy vehicle system on the public realm. It asks if these new technologies are going to change cities.

This animation, located in Cleveland Street, Redfern, Sydney, includes a major arterial north–south four lane road bifurcated with line-marking. In this animation, the communication from the CAREV is displayed at night to create contrast. The choreographed traffic pattern of the CAREV is revealed with the novel communications system. The animation investigates the sequence of colour and lighting emanating from the communications unit as a simulation. The animation explores the potential visual effects of a CAREVs using the digital CAREV communications unit employing an artistic and functional output. An environmental semiotic could be explored though mobile devices to provide energy, efficiency, and commercial data for the CAREV user. The intention behind this experimental study is to test the aesthetics that may arise from the CAREV communications unit. This assists with providing partial answers for research questions and data for the practice research.

The real-world abstraction model is taken from Cleveland Street, Surry Hills, and forms the basis of the communications unit simulations presented later in this report.