Visual research in landscape architecture

A core activity of landscape architecture is designing and construction of outdoor space. In addition to that landscape architecture can be considered a matter of epistemology, a way of looking, with the architectonic composition as core of landscape architectonic research and design. An architectural composition can be comprehended by addressing four layers of interest: basic form, corporeal form, visible form and purposive intention. This article argues that GISc offers researchers new possibilities for representing, analysing and modelling landscape architectonic compositions to study its visible form. The visible form derives from the act of perceiving, which is linked with the sequential unfolding of information as our bodies pass through space. We can understand the visible form from the vertical perspective, its conceptual order, and from the horizontal perspective, its perceptual order. GISc in relation to the conceptual order deals with geometric properties such as shape, symmetry, rhythm, alignment, congruence, and repetition. GISc in relation to the perceptual order considers landscape architectonic compositions as it is encountered by an individual within it, moving through it, making use of GIS-based isovists and viewsheds. This article focuses on the analysis of the relationship between the conceptual and perceptual order of a landscape architectonic composition by measuring visible space, using GIS-based methods and techniques and link the outcomes to the geometric properties of the design. Piazza San Marco (Venice, IT) and Stourhead landscape garden (Wiltshire, UK) are used as examples to showcase some applications

The role of the ventral intraparietal area (VIP/pVIP) in parsing optic flow into visual motion caused by self-motion and visual motion produced by object-motion

Retinal image motion is a composite signal that contains information about two behaviourally significant factors: self-motion and the movement of environmental objects. It is thought that the brain separates the two relevant signals, and although multiple brain regions have been identified that respond selectively to the composite optic flow signal, which brain region(s) perform the parsing process remains unknown. Here, we present original evidence that the putative human ventral intraparietal area (pVIP), a region known to receive optic flow signals as well as independent self-motion signals from other sensory modalities, plays a critical role in the parsing process and acts to isolate object-motion. We localised pVIP using its multisensory response profile, and then tested its relative responses to simulated object-motion and self-motion stimuli; results indicated that responses were much stronger in pVIP to stimuli that specified object-motion. We report two further observations that will be significant for the future direction of research in this area; firstly, activation in pVIP was suppressed by distant stationary objects compared to the absence of objects or closer objects. Secondly, we describe several other brain regions that share with pVIP selectivity for visual object-motion over visual self-motion as well as a multisensory response

GIS-based landscape design research

Landscape design research is important for cultivating spatial intelligence in landscape architecture. This study explores GIS (geographic information systems) as a tool for landscape design research - investigating landscape designs to understand them as architectonic compositions (architectonic plan analysis). The concept ‘composition’ refers to a conceivable arrangement, an architectural expression of a mental construct that is legible and open to interpretation. Landscape architectonic compositions and their representations embody a great wealth of design knowledge as objects of our material culture and reflect the possible treatment of the ground, space, image and program as a characteristic coherence. By exploring landscape architectonic compositions with GIS, design researchers can acquire design knowledge that can be used in the creation and refinement of a design.  The research aims to identify and illustrate the potential role of GIS as a tool in landscape design research, so as to provide insight into the possibilities and limitations of using GIS in this capacity. The critical, information-oriented case of Stourhead landscape garden (Wiltshire, UK), an example of a designed landscape that covers the scope and remit of landscape architecture design, forms the heart of the study. The exploration of Stourhead by means of GIS can be understood as a plausibility probe. Here the case study is considered a form of ‘quasi-experiment’, testing the hypothesis and generating a learning process that constitutes a prerequisite for advanced understanding, while using an adjusted version of the framework for landscape design analysis by Steenbergen and Reh (2003). This is a theoretically informed analytical method based on the formal interpretation of the landscape architectonic composition addressing four landscape architectonic categories: the basic, the spatial, the symbolic and the programmatic form. This study includes new aspects to be analysed, such as the visible form and the shape of the walk, and serves as the basis for the landscape architectonic analysis in which GIS is used as the primary analytical tool.  GIS-based design research has the possibility to cultivate spatial intelligence in landscape architecture through three fields of operation: GIS-based modelling: description of existing and future landscape architectonic compositions in digital form; GIS-based analysis: exploration, analysis and synthesis of landscape architectonic compositions in order to reveal latent architectonic relationships and principles, while utilizing the processing capacities and possibilities of computers for ex-ante and ex-post simulation and evaluation; GIS-based visual representation: representation of (virtual) landscape architectonic compositions in space and time, in order to retrieve and communicate information and knowledge of the landscape design.  Though there are limitations, this study exemplifies that GIS is a powerful instrument to acquire knowledge from landscape architectonic compositions. The study points out that the application of GIS in landscape design research can be seen as an extension of the fundamental cycle of observation, visual representation, analysis and interpretation in the process of knowledge acquisition, with alternative visualisations and digital landscape models as important means for this process. Using the calculating power of computers, combined with inventive modelling, analysis and visualisation concepts in an interactive process, opened up possibilities to reveal new information and knowledge about the basic, spatial, symbolic and programmatic form of Stourhead. GIS extended the design researchers’ perception via measurement, simulation and experimentation, and at the same time offered alternative ways of understanding the landscape architectonic composition. This gave rise to the possibility of exploring new elements in the framework of landscape design research, such as the visible form and kinaesthetic aspects, analysing the composition from eyelevel perspective. Moreover, the case study showcases that GIS has the potential to measure phenomena that are often subject to intuitive and experimental design, combining general scientific knowledge of, for instance, visual perception and way-finding, with the examination of site-specific design applications. GIS also enabled one to understand the landscape architectonic composition of Stourhead as a product of time, via the analysis of its development through reconstruction and evaluation of several crucial time-slice snapshots. The study illustrates that GIS can be regarded an external cognitive tool that facilitates and mediates in design knowledge acquisition. GIS facilitates in the sense that it can address the ‘same types of design-knowledge’ regarding the basic, spatial, symbolic and programmatic form, but in a more precise, systematic, transparent, and quantified manner. GIS mediates in the sense that it influences what and how aspects of the composition can be understood and therefore enables design researchers to generate ‘new types of design-knowledge’ by advanced spatial analysis and the possibility of linking or integrating other information layers, fields of science and data sources. The research contributes to the development and distribution of knowledge of GIS-applications in landscape architecture in two ways: (1) by ‘following’ the discipline and developing aspects of it, and (2) by setting in motion fundamental developments in the field, providing alternative readings of landscape architecture designs

GIS-based landscape design research:

Landscape design research is important for cultivating spatial intelligence in landscape architecture. This study explores GIS (geographic information systems) as a tool for landscape design research - investigating landscape designs to understand them as architectonic compositions (architectonic plan analysis). The concept ‘composition’ refers to a conceivable arrangement, an architectural expression of a mental construct that is legible and open to interpretation. Landscape architectonic compositions and their representations embody a great wealth of design knowledge as objects of our material culture and reflect the possible treatment of the ground, space, image and program as a characteristic coherence. By exploring landscape architectonic compositions with GIS, design researchers can acquire design knowledge that can be used in the creation and refinement of a design.  The research aims to identify and illustrate the potential role of GIS as a tool in landscape design research, so as to provide insight into the possibilities and limitations of using GIS in this capacity. The critical, information-oriented case of Stourhead landscape garden (Wiltshire, UK), an example of a designed landscape that covers the scope and remit of landscape architecture design, forms the heart of the study. The exploration of Stourhead by means of GIS can be understood as a plausibility probe. Here the case study is considered a form of ‘quasi-experiment’, testing the hypothesis and generating a learning process that constitutes a prerequisite for advanced understanding, while using an adjusted version of the framework for landscape design analysis by Steenbergen and Reh (2003). This is a theoretically informed analytical method based on the formal interpretation of the landscape architectonic composition addressing four landscape architectonic categories: the basic, the spatial, the symbolic and the programmatic form. This study includes new aspects to be analysed, such as the visible form and the shape of the walk, and serves as the basis for the landscape architectonic analysis in which GIS is used as the primary analytical tool.  GIS-based design research has the possibility to cultivate spatial intelligence in landscape architecture through three fields of operation: GIS-based modelling: description of existing and future landscape architectonic compositions in digital form; GIS-based analysis: exploration, analysis and synthesis of landscape architectonic compositions in order to reveal latent architectonic relationships and principles, while utilizing the processing capacities and possibilities of computers for ex-ante and ex-post simulation and evaluation; GIS-based visual representation: representation of (virtual) landscape architectonic compositions in space and time, in order to retrieve and communicate information and knowledge of the landscape design.  Though there are limitations, this study exemplifies that GIS is a powerful instrument to acquire knowledge from landscape architectonic compositions. The study points out that the application of GIS in landscape design research can be seen as an extension of the fundamental cycle of observation, visual representation, analysis and interpretation in the process of knowledge acquisition, with alternative visualisations and digital landscape models as important means for this process. Using the calculating power of computers, combined with inventive modelling, analysis and visualisation concepts in an interactive process, opened up possibilities to reveal new information and knowledge about the basic, spatial, symbolic and programmatic form of Stourhead. GIS extended the design researchers’ perception via measurement, simulation and experimentation, and at the same time offered alternative ways of understanding the landscape architectonic composition. This gave rise to the possibility of exploring new elements in the framework of landscape design research, such as the visible form and kinaesthetic aspects, analysing the composition from eyelevel perspective. Moreover, the case study showcases that GIS has the potential to measure phenomena that are often subject to intuitive and experimental design, combining general scientific knowledge of, for instance, visual perception and way-finding, with the examination of site-specific design applications. GIS also enabled one to understand the landscape architectonic composition of Stourhead as a product of time, via the analysis of its development through reconstruction and evaluation of several crucial time-slice snapshots. The study illustrates that GIS can be regarded an external cognitive tool that facilitates and mediates in design knowledge acquisition. GIS facilitates in the sense that it can address the ‘same types of design-knowledge’ regarding the basic, spatial, symbolic and programmatic form, but in a more precise, systematic, transparent, and quantified manner. GIS mediates in the sense that it influences what and how aspects of the composition can be understood and therefore enables design researchers to generate ‘new types of design-knowledge’ by advanced spatial analysis and the possibility of linking or integrating other information layers, fields of science and data sources. The research contributes to the development and distribution of knowledge of GIS-applications in landscape architecture in two ways: (1) by ‘following’ the discipline and developing aspects of it, and (2) by setting in motion fundamental developments in the field, providing alternative readings of landscape architecture designs

Virtual Laboratory for Experimentation of Architectural Space

indexada en ISI CPCI Conference proceedings citation index Y Google SchoolarFor the teaching of the subject of architectural projects is necessary to train the student in a certain capacity to imagine spaces. Hence, testing of these spaces is always considered as a fundamental part of architectural education. Building a virtual space, enhance, to a large extent, the possibility of, as with any virtual simulator, acquire the necessary spatial experience for the development of spatial ideas themselves. The project proposes to construct, via internet, in a virtual world. In this virtual world the University of Seville already has a space in use for its activities. In this area, experimental space where buildings will be built, some will be recreations of basic pieces of architectural history and other experimental spaces. Your virtual tour will be possible, thus being a useful tool in providing an experience, not static in space

Beyond two dimensions: architecture through three dimensional visibility graph analysis

Architecture consists of spatial relations that accommodate functions, afford social relations and create visual interest. Through openings and walls, architects manipulate continuities and discontinuities of visual fields in two and three dimensions. Analytical diagrams and models of these fields have been offered by space syntax, especially through visibility graph analysis (VGA), graphing visual relations in two dimensions. This paper introduces a new approach to VGA that departs from planar restrictions. We show how a graph can be generated of inter-visible locations on a planar surface that incorporates relations among elements in three dimensions. Using this method, we extend the current space syntax analysis of architectural space to a new methodology for diagramming and modelling three-dimensional visual relationships in architecture. The paper is structured in three parts. The first section provides an overview of the principles of visibility analysis using graphs, and explains the method by which visibility relations of ‘accessible’ and ‘inaccessible’ space in two and three dimensions are computed. This leads to a graph representation, which uses a mix of ‘directed’ and ‘undirected’ visibility connections, and a new multi-variant spatial categorisation analysis that informs the properties of multi-directional graphs. The second part of the paper tests the three-dimensional visibility model through the analysis of hypothetical and real spatial environments. The third part analyses Giuseppe Terragni’s Casa del Fascio, describing architectural characteristics that are not captured by two-dimensional analysis, and allowing a comparative understanding of spatial configuration in two and three dimensions. The paper concludes with a discussion about the significance of this new model as an analytical and architectural tool

Exploring the Visual Landscape: Advances in Physiognomic Landscape Research in the Netherlands

Exploring the Visual Landscape is about the combination of landscape research and planning, visual perception and Geographic Information Science. It showcases possible ways of getting a grip on themes like: landscape openness, cluttering of the rural landscape, high-rise buildings in relation to cityscape, historic landscapes and motorway panoramas. It offers clues for visual landscape assessment of spaces in cities, parks and rural areas. In that respect, it extends the long tradition in the Netherlands on physiognomic landscape research and shows the state of the art at this moment. Exploring the Visual Landscape offers important clues for theory, methodology and application in research and development of landscapes all over the world, from a specifically Dutch academic context. It provides a wide range of insights into the psychological background of landscape perception, the technical considerations of geomatics and methodology in landscape architecture, urban planning and design. Furthermore, there are some experiences worthwhile considering, which demonstrate how this research can be applied in the practice of landscape policy making

The Influence of Openings on Energy Demand of Buildings: Analysis of their Characteristic Parameters Using LIDER Software (Spain)

Openings on buildings façades perform several functions, namely, illumination, ventilation, vision, and communication with outside conditions. Furthermore, when energy efficiency is to be considered, the opening plays a major part in the energetic balance of a building. This article studies the opening as a specialized low technology system which regulates the external climatic conditions having an impact on the building energy demand. First, it was analysed the main parameters that characterize the opening as an element of solar reception in order to indentify the influence of each of them with regard to energy demand. By means of LIDER software calculation method the opening is studied as a solar gain element. LIDER is a recognized free computer programme of Spanish Building Regulation (Código Técnico de la Edificación, CTE). The contribution of 14 specific parameters of the opening to energy demand is evaluated, specifically, orientation, window-to-wall ratio, frame percentage, degree of absorption, glazing g-value, frame U-value, glazing U-value, overhangs, returns, louver blinds, awnings, air permeability, infiltration and air change rate. With this approach, it was obtained the relative relevance of the 14 parameters under study with regards to energy performance of a simulated space considering the conditions set in the analysis. The alteration in those parameters allows for variations in energy demand estimated at the range 10-60% in heating, and between 2-150% in cooling. The outcomes are more important in qualitative than in quantitative terms due to the limitations of the method and to the working hypotheses of the onset conditions

Earthquakes and ghost towns in Sicily: from the Valle del Belìce in 1968 to the Val di Noto in 1693. The first stage of the virtual seismic itinerary through Italy

Destructive earthquakes leave traces not only on the physical landscape but also on human processes. Among the most devastating consequences is the abandoning of towns and villages, in favour of locations deemed safer. Abandoning a village and resettling in a new location, whether a gradual process or the result of a sudden traumatic situation, is an event of great historical, cultural and anthropological impact. It entails the loss of a piece of history or culture – local identity – and the more suddenly it happens, the more dramatic the after-effects. Italy has almost two hundred localities that have been abandoned for different causes (landslides, floods, volcanic eruptions, but also social or environmental reasons), some ninety of them owing to earthquakes. Sicily, a land of volcanoes and earthquakes, has several traces of former villages either in the form of fairly substantial ruins or even half-destroyed, which are usually located a few kilometres away from the new settlements. In this paper, we present the methodological approach developed in the framework of the EDURISK Project to enhance the awareness of seismic risk as an element of daily life; the case-study of the Valle del Belìce after the 1968 earthquakes represents the richness and complexity of this approach well. Following this rationale, in 2006, we published the first multimedia product devoted to Sicily based on the tools available at that time: a DVD-Rom hosting the interactive Quick TimeTM Virtual Reality format. Today, multimedia technology is much more advanced and web- oriented, but the methodological approach is still valid

Digital creativity - an investigation into architectural design in the electronic age

A dissertation submitted to the University of Bedfordshire in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy.This study explores approaches to architectural creativity and collaborative design in the contemporary digital design context. The thesis identifies key trends and developments in the historical and present-day evolution of the creative use of computers by architects in education and practice. It examines the current manifestations of digitally supported architectural design, and investigates the ways in which computers and electronic communication technologies are being utilised in the design process. In the context of, and informed by, this investigative survey the author evolves three key models or analogues for the application of computer based techniques in the creative design process. Each design analogue has been tested with the collaboration of undergraduate architecture students and their academic teaching staff through experimental pedagogic design projects, which have been used to evaluate their validity and effectiveness. The working principles developed through these projects have also been applied in a realworld context, through a live professional case study architectural project undertaken by the author in commercial architectural practice. The concluding section examines the current state of play in the relationship between theoretical ideas and the practice of architectural design using digital techniques, to assess the methodological validity of the design analogues in the educational and practice spheres, and to make recommendations for future areas of research