Between Mediation and Making CIMSp: a Technoà¨tic Modus Operandi

The following paper describes an ongoing research project whose goal is to define a scalable, hybrid production and deployment protocol (CIMSp) for the creation of virtual environments (VE). Ultimately, the aim is to establish a creative workflow and infrastructure that embodies architectural and urban design activity as practiced by the research unit. The objective of the present paper is to schematically outline the current state of the research and its practical and theoretical context for further development. A theoretical position will be stated which assumes that the content, tool, epistemological, and speculative realms are consubstantial (technosis). The practical endeavour is to create the informational and embodied temporal--spatial condition of possibility for the imaginative production of cultural artifacts. It must accommodate varying individual and collaborative forms and styles of making and no presumption of a self-enclosed and referential system is made. A critical position is particularly compelling when this production is immersed in technological modalities of making where information and embodiment are inextricably intertwined. CIMSp is based on the workflow from acquisition and creation to output and storage. The work environment is comprised of a select set of software applications and visualization technologies. Secondly, an XML-based content and information management system is under construction to ensure project quality control, rigorous documentation practices, and bi-directional knowledge feedback procedures to enable an effective and resource-full workflow. Lastly, scalability of output modalities for use in the design process and for final presentation from WWW deployment to a high-resolution collaborative work environment (CWE) is being developed. The protocol is a multiuser mode of creation and production that aims to transform the technologies and their interrelation, thus dramatically impacting the creative process and intended content. It is a digital production workflow that embodies intensive visualization criteria demanded by the end users. The theoretical and practical intention of CIMSp is to provisionally structure the collaborative creative process and enable a choreographed movement between the realms of the technologically mediated and made in the pursuit of significant digital content creation

Eucalyptus: User Controlled Lightpath Enabled Participatory Design Studio

A new notion of participation is at stake with advances in technologically mediated work environments. The digitally mediated e-design studio has been around since the mid-1990's and has been employed in various forms in disciplines including architecture/engineering/construction (AEC), industrial design, and the automotive industry. Insufficient bandwidth and insufficiently powerful, crudely coordinated tools resulted in distributed task-based modes of collaboration that did not allow full participation by members of the distributed design team. At the very least, the present “second generation” network severely limits the applications, tools, and modes of communication that can be used in data and visualization intense design scenarios. The emergence of Service Oriented Architectures and User-Controlled LightPaths (“intelligent infrastructure”) herald the beginning of a new age where fully participatory multi-site design may become possible. The networks, visualization & communication tools, Service Oriented Architecture & Web Services, work protocols, and physical site designs of the Participatory Design Studio (PDS) being developed by the authors will constitute one of the first working examples of this future. This paper will briefly outline the “mise en scene” or staging of the technical configuration of the Eucalyptus project, observations and results from the creative activity of the PDS in the context of two case studies, and speculate on the implications for design activity, pedagogy, and a more robust mode of participation.

Three Little Shacks

The paper is premised upon the notion that tools and techniques have the potential to resist the premature prefiguring of problems and solutions in projectbased activity, with particular relevance in collaborative design practices. The architect’s métier and mode of knowledge production is marked by the capacity to make artefacts. Because our age is characterized by the imperative to innovate and evolve technically, architectural ideation must now engage an array of computationally-based tools for imaging, information management, simulation and fabrication. This paper, framed within the theoretical and productive context of a research-creation project, investigates the ontological status of process-work, speed, and the notion of failing fast through the prototyping of three small buildings, or shacks. It does this through a strategic choreography of factual and counterfactual investigations that give rise to fabricative knowledge incapable of being prescribed conceptually from the outset. It will be claimed that, in the case of architecture, the potential of technics to reflectively and playfully re-work things and ideas is also a participatory mode of ethical engagement

1:1 @ Carleton University School of Architecture

There exists a long-standing tradition of full-scale construction in the design studio at the Carleton University School of Architecture. The mantra "building as speculation" is explicitly evoked in varying studio and workshop contexts, ubiquitous within the fabric of the curriculum and design culture of the school. The value placed on 1:1 material engagement and construction techniques is qualified by an understanding of drawing (traditional and technological) as a form of critical, theoretical, and practical speculation. "Building speculations" at Carleton, in other words, are not constrained to conventional notions of design/build, but occur freely in the studio as a form of "sketching" or "modeling" that informs a wide range of design activities. Supported by a fully equipped metal and wood shop and photographic, video, and digital facilities, the "build" tradition at Carleton continues to adjust and transform according to the demands of architectural pedagogy

Participation, Intersubjectivity, and Presence in a Digitally Mediated Workspace: a Participatory Design Studio between Pennsylvania State University and Carleton University

A paradigm shift in the world of architecture brought by the recent developments in visualization and communication technology not only offers us drastically different ways to collaborate, but also questions traditional location dependent collaborations. This new technology offers us new possibilities for a more phenomenologically rich mode of creative activity and participation. The goal of the Participatory Design Studio was to allow architecture students in multiple locations to collaborate in real-time by sharing computational resources, geometric datasets, and multimedia content including high-definition video. The technologies involved in this research include the National LambdaRail (layer 3, PacketNet with 1Gb/s connection) and CA*net 4 (Canadian broadband layer 2 with 10gb/s lightpath connectivity) allowing Standard Definition videoconference, utilization of Deep Computing Visualization, Remote Visual Networking (RVN) and Web Service access and control of the APN devices through the dashboard solution that makes integration seamless to the workflow and transparent to the user

A Theory of Artistry for 3D Data Fusion - the element of craft in digital reconstruction

The following paper will articulate through an urban renewal proposal project for an area in Montréal, Canada that uses a “3D imaging and modelling protocol” and that accounts for the interaction between mediation and making in digitizing and constructing existing conditions digital artifacts.  The protocol incorporates multi-sensor technologies with modelling and rendering techniques through a process of interpolation between a heterogeneous set of existing photographic, physical, and 2D documentation. The mode of operation implemented is a multi-layered and hybrid approach that recognizes the interplay between human scale and perception, visualization and abstraction of data and geometric accuracy, space and time.

A Cyber-Enabled Collaborative Design Studio

The research project investigates the use of a network-enabled platform involving a combination of technologies. As a preliminary report on a proof-of-concept design studio conducted in 2007 between Carleton University and Pennsylvania State University, the paper first describes the implementation of this network-centric collaborative design platform. The report articulates the “staging” of the conditions of possibility for a dynamic interplay between technological mediation and the reality of making, then compares the use of high bandwidth technology with customized symmetrical toolsets in the telecollaborative environment, versus commercial toolsets deployed over moderate bandwidth connections. In each setting, the collaborative environment is assessed according to issues encountered by students and design outcomes. The effectiveness of the digitally mediated collaborative studio is also gauged in terms of student reaction to the learning process via feedback surveys and questionnaires

Intelligent Infrastructure Enabled Participatory Design Studio - Eucalyptus: Collaborating at the speed of light

A new notion of participation is at stake with advances in technologically mediated work environments. Insufficient bandwidth and insufficiently powerful, crudely coordinated tools resulted in distributed task-based modes of collaboration that did not allow full participation by members of the distributed design team. The emergence of Service Oriented Architectures and User-Controlled LightPaths (“intelligent infrastructure”) herald the beginning of a new age where fully participatory multi-site design may become possible. This paper will briefly outline the “mise en scnei or staging of the technical configuration of the Eucalyptus project, observations and results from the creative activity of the PDS in the context of two case studies, and speculate on the implications for design activity, pedagogy, and a more robust mode of participation.