Cool Graffiti Video

MUTO a wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.

Tokyo Now Colloquium

Joshua Howell and Aaron Forbes will be presenting a paper titled "Tokyo: Techno City, a Study of Theory, Architecture and Popular Culture" at the Tokyo Now Colloquium this coming Saturday, May 31 at UCLA AUD. The colloquium will be held from 9am-3pm in DeCafe.

Paper Synopsis:
Since the 1960's, personal electronic devices and mass communications has altered the physical development of the urban fabric. Theorists from all social and cultural arenas have hypothesized how these mobile objects could become primary agents of the next generation and impact every facet of culture. This paper simultaneously traces social theory, architectural projects and popular culture examples of how mobile electronic devices and mass communication have altered urban environments.
Raynor Banham, in the 1960's writes of small self contained, low cost, electronic devices which have the ability to transform circumstances into conditions of human desires. Banham's vision has become a reality in modern day Tokyo, where personal electronic devices have given people more power than all of Banham's gizmo's combined. The extraordinary power of these devices have called into question the need for physical space and transformed the way in which architects and planners design environments.
The screen becomes the new cross roads of Tokyo. Cell phone and text messaging have reduced physical landmarks to a relic of the past and even begun to eliminate the need for face to face physical interaction. Electronic communication mediums break down cultural distinctions of language, and location through the use of universals such as sequential images and soundtracks. In this new electronically immersive environment, the mobile telephone is no longer just a device to talk into, but a remote control for your life.

Installation Update

A few images and video from the interactive installation I am working on with two other UCLA students. Using code written in processing, the servos will be controlled through an ultra-sonic proximety sensor. The box for the installation is divided up into 5 zones, each with its own servo. A single sensor is able to control behavior for all 5 servos separately based on distance of an object (person).

Hernesaari Urban Plan: Tower core and surface articulation

As a programmatic strategy, we have been working towards creating a "vertical urbanism" within the towers. This idea obviously ties back to several previous posts about the vertical urbanism of Tokyo, yet in this situation we are dealing with a new development in a significantly lower density urban milieu. However, Helsinki already has an interesting mixed use typology already in place, which we are closely trying to follow. There are many vertical and underground shopping centers which are very different from developments you would see in the US. There are also several successful instances of restuarants and bars being located on the top of residential and office towers, which is an example of time based use as a device to increase the vibrancy of singular buildings. This was a large part of the thesis for my Little Tokyo project from last Winter Quarter.

In the programming of the towers, we have developed ratios of residential, office, entertainment, retail, essential commericial and hotel which are applied to each tower individually based on contextual information, parking, transportation infrastructure, views and proximety to boat berths. For example, the two largest towers are located at the entrance to the development, with the best access to public transportation (tram and bus) as well as close proximety to the bridge connecting Hernesaari with the new development being planned for the peninsula directly West. These towers at 20 stories also have the best views of the city, ocean and marina, as well as being a logical transition between the city of Helsinki proper and the new cruise ship terminal on our site. Because of these factors we have given the towers a ratio of 40% high end residential, 30% office, and 30% recreational shopping.



For the articulation of these program mixtures, we've scripted a process which offsets the tower surface to create an inner skin. This offset distance varies depending on the program mixture. The residential spaces receive a low offset, so that they sit very close to the outer surface, while entertainment and commercial spaces get offset farther inwards, creating a situation where the public programs sit within the poche space of the wall section. As a happy, but unintended side effect of the script, this also tends to create "bleb" spaces... to borrow a term from Greg Lynn. These blebs topologically follow the surface direction and curvature, but also as applied ornament.





The script is posted below:

/* --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

OFFSET POLYGONAL SURFACE BASED ON PROXIMITY TO LOCATORS

begin by manually locating locators in space to define offset amount. polygons will offset linearly from locator through distance
defined by variable "offsetDist". first select object for offset prior to running the script. can use a maximum of 3 locators.

script written by Joshua Howell
UCLA Spring 2008, Kivi Sotamaa studio

Status: 05-25-2008: working!


*/

$cvCount = polyEvaluate -v;


$list = `ls-sl`; //define variables
$object = $list[0]; //define object for offset

int $offsetDist = 3;
rename "object";
xform -cp;


vector $ptLocatorA = `pointPosition -w ("locator1")`;
vector $ptLocatorB = `pointPosition -w ("locator2")`;
vector $ptLocatorC = `pointPosition -w ("locator3")`;

for ($i = 0; $i<= $cvCount; $i++) { vector $ptObject = `pointPosition -w ("object" + ".vtx[" + $i + "]")`; float $aa = (($ptLocatorA.x) - ($ptObject.x)); float $ba = (($ptLocatorA.y) - ($ptObject.y)); float $ca = (($ptLocatorA.z) - ($ptObject.z)); float $ab = (($ptLocatorB.x) - ($ptObject.x)); float $bb = (($ptLocatorB.y) - ($ptObject.y)); float $cb = (($ptLocatorB.z) - ($ptObject.z)); float $ac = (($ptLocatorC.x) - ($ptObject.x)); float $bc = (($ptLocatorC.y) - ($ptObject.y)); float $cc = (($ptLocatorC.z) - ($ptObject.z)); float $da = sqrt(((($aa*$aa) + ($ba*$ba) + ($ca*$ca)))); float $db = sqrt(((($ab*$ab) + ($bb*$bb) + ($cb*$cb)))); float $dc = sqrt(((($ac*$ac) + ($bc*$bc) + ($cc*$cc)))); select ("object" + ".vtx[" + $i + "]"); if (($da<$db) && ($da<$dc) && (($offsetDist-$da)>0))

moveVertexAlongDirection -n (-($offsetDist-$da));

else

if (($db<$da) && ($db<$dc) && (($offsetDist-$db)>0))

moveVertexAlongDirection -n (-($offsetDist-$db));

else

if (($dc<$db) && ($dc<$da) && (($offsetDist-$dc)>0))

moveVertexAlongDirection -n (-($offsetDist-$dc));

else
moveVertexAlongDirection -n (-0.5); //move faces too far away from locators 1/2 meter in from outer surface

}