SEMESTER 2, 2011 (FINAL PROJECT OF THE YEAR!)

Subject: Design Studio 4
Project 3: Barangaroo Pathways 
Task: To design a pedestrian pathway system that connects the foreshore to the city, through the three project areas of the Barangaroo Precinct - the Headland Park, Barangaroo Central and Barangaroo South.

Concept Statement in the post to follow :)

This is a real life project that the Barangaroo Authorities are planning to develop in the CBD of Sydney. Our First Year COFA Design Students are given the opportunity to design for the Barangaroo Authorities, and potentially, if good enough, our designs could be chosen to develop in the precinct.

SEMESTER 2, 2011

Subject: Design Studio 3
Project 2: Analysing and Design Principles
Task: Endotopic & Exotopic Designs

Concept Statement

This project involved the experimentation with different weights and proportions of balsa wood in model making. My initial inspiration for this project came from the violin because I used to play this instrument. I was particularly interested in exploring the shape of the violin and the music it produces in both endotopic and exotopic model forms. My idea for this project was to focus on how music is produced when playing the violin. In both models, I explored how the sound vibrations implode within its structure and how the sound waves explode from its framework.

For my endotopic model that is geometrically inspired, I broke down the parts of the violin by taking only its bout and simplified its structure by using straight and sharp edges. The model is made up of balsa sticks cut at equal lengths and at angled edges of 30^o to form triangles and 45^o to form squares. I used geometric, triangular shapes to represent the invisible sound waves that implode within the structure of the violin as it is played. The triangular shapes implodes towards the centre of the structure as well as point in different directions to portray how sound vibrations bounce from place to place at random. Though the sound vibrations move around at random, it is still contained within the walls of the violin, therefore imploding in within its framework.

My exotopic model that is organically inspired is also a study of how music is produced, this time exploding out from its framework. While sound vibrations are normally contained within, it is the sound waves that explode out to create music. Once again I took the shape of the bout and further simplified its structure to form smooth curves, especially around the middle bout (or also know as its C-bout). With the endotopic model, I had the sound vibrations implode towards the centre; and with my exotopic model, I had the sound waves explode from the centre to show that the vibrations then later translate to waves that burst out to create music. Swirls of different lengths and sized are used to represent the different sound waves that produce different sounds and pitch for different notes. This model is made out of sheets of balsa that are cut to size and soaked in boiling water to make the wood flexible for bending and twisting into the shapes I wanted.

The difficulty that I encountered with this project is the manipulating of the sheets of balsa. At first, I had trouble making the swirls for my exotopic models, snapping many pieces of wood until realising that I should soak the wood in boiling water (instead of hot/warm water) and leave it soaked for at least an hour to make it preventable from snapping. The successes of this project would be when I was able to make the swirls when I had changed my tactics and waiting time. The geometric model wasn’t much of a challenge but more time consuming in a way that I had to cut the edges of the sticks at 30^o angles so that they would fit with the other pieces to form an equilateral triangle.