NEW YORK, NY | NEW YORK CITY COLLEGE OF TECHNOLOGY | INTERACTIVE SURFACES WORKSHOP | APRIL 12, 2013

I am excited to be teaching a one-day Interactive Surfaces workshop for the upcoming Facades+ Conference being held in New York City on April 11th-12th.  The event has an amazing line up of speakers and workshops which are being taught by some of the industries leaders including: Robert Aish (Autodesk), Nathan Miller (Case), Skylar Tibbits (MIT + Ted Fellow), Neil Meredith (Gehry Tech), and John Sargent (SOM).

The Interactive Surfaces workshop will concentrate on producing facade prototypes that are configurable, sensate, and active.  The facade of a building is the liminal surface across which information and environmental performance is frequently negotiated.  Given dynamic context of our built environment; the facade must be capable of intelligent adaptation over time.

In this workshop, we'll be focusing on new hardware and software prototyping techniques; primarily focusing on a wide range of sensing and actuation modalities in order to build novel interactive devices. Using remote sensors, microcontrollers (Arduino), and actuators, we will build virtual and physical prototypes that can communicate with humans and the world around them.  Using both Grasshopper and the Firefly plug-in, you will learn how to create intelligent control strategies for interactive or responsive facades.

Click here to sign up!

The participants who sign up for this workshop will also be the first to get their hands on the new Firefly Interactive Prototyping Sheild which I have been developing. This shield provides access to a number of built-in, ready-to-use sensors and actuators including: 3 linear sliders (potentiometers), a light sensor, a two-axis joystick, 3 push buttons, a red LED, a yellow LED, a Green LED, and a Tri-color LED, 2 servo connections, and a high-voltage MOSFET circuit capable of driving lights, valves, DC motors, etc.  Each participant will not only walk away with a kick ass new hardware kit, but valuable knowledge in how to create new types of interactive prototypes!

BILLERICA, MA | OBJET HEADQUARTERS | SYNTHETIC LANDSCAPES WORKSHOP | FEB 29TH-MAR 1ST, 2012

This intensive two-day workshop at the Objet Headquarters in Billerica, MA will provide workshop participants the opportunity to work with a team of expert consultants, to hone their digital and prototyping skills, to experiment with a range of digital production tools, and to design and fabricate a unique set of components that negotiate a range of material gradients across a field condition. Through iteration, participants will generate and fabricate components (parts) to form a larger network (whole). The goal of this workshop is to combine technological precision (Objet – Connex) and pedagogical creativity (curriculum) to explicate the creative potentials of both the various forms of software and materials-based investigations that could be replicated in curriculum.

The results of the workshop will be showcased at the Boston Park Plaza, formally presented during a Special Focus Session on Friday, 02 March during the 100th ACSA Annual Meeting, and be part of a traveling exhibition that will circulate North America in 2012.

Consultants:

*Gregory Luhan (ACSA/ACADIA organizer)
MIT: Justin Lavallee, Neri Oxman, and 2-4 MIT student assistants
ACADIA: *Gil Akos, *Kyle Miller, *Ronnie Parsons, *Andy Payne

* Designates Workshop Leaders

Schedule:

Wednesday, February 29th

8:00am: Buses leave for Objet Headquarters
9:30am: Orientation and introduction of the project, tour of labs, presentation of Objet machine
12:00pm: Lunch Provided
12:30–6:00pm: Work in small groups, with consultation from instructors
6:00–7:00pm: Dinner Provided
7:00–10:00pm: Shop/lab access
10:00pm: Buses return to the hotel

Thursday, March 1st

 8:00am: Buses leave for Objet Headquarters
9:00–12:00am: Continued work
12:00am: Lunch Provided
12:00–3:00pm: Final shop/lab access
3:00–6:00pm: Buses leave Objet Headquarters - participants take projects to Park Plaza for display in the ACSA Annual Meeting Exhibit Hall.
6:00–7:30pm: ACSA Annual Meeting Keynote Panel on Digital Technologies by: Sanford Kwinter. Jeff Kipnis, Sylvia Lavin, Katheryn Gustafson, Mark Burry
7:30–9:00pm: Reception in the Exhibit Hall (featuring the final designs by the workshop).

Friday, March 2nd

ACADIA @ Digital Appitudes | Synthetic Landscapes
Special Focus Session to discuss pedagogical implications of the workshop. Panelists include team leaders, workshop attendees, and Piet Meijs.

Using the Digital Aptitudes workshop hosted by Objet as a critical point of departure, this moderated session will focus on linking the pedagogical to the technological. Short presentations by panelists Kyle Miller, Andy Payne, Gil Akos, Ronnie Parsons, Justin Lavallee, Piet Meijs, and Gregory Luhan will frame the conceptual underpinnings of workshop as part of an embedded, participatory, and replicable art-to-part curriculum developed with Neri Oxman. The presenter’s own research into areas including flexible form manufacturing, site malleable construction, building performance, and blended materials research will align the concept-to-completion workshop outcomes as logical extensions of an otherwise technologically-driven and application-based synthetic ecology.

For more information about this workshop and Registration information visit:

• http://www.acsa-arch.org/programs-events/conferences/annual-meeting/100th-annual-meeting/pre-conference

I am very happy to announce that my full-paper titled A Five-Axis Robotic Motion Controller for Designers has been accepted for presentation and publication in the conference proceedings of the ACADIA 2011 conference to be held at the Banff Center, Calgary Canada from Oct. 11th-16th, 2011.  You can find out more about the entire line-up of speakers on the ACADIA website.  I'll also be releasing more information about this project (and paper) very soon, so stay tuned. 

I would also like to mention that I will be teaching a two-day workshop on physical computing (using Arduino, Grasshopper, and Firefly) as part of the ACADIA pre-conference workshop series.  This fast-paced workshop will focus on hardware and software prototyping techniques.  For more information, see the workshop description below.

Workshop Description: 

In 1991, Mark Weiser published a paper in Scientific American titled, The Computer for the 21st Century, where he predicted that as technology advanced, becoming cheaper, smaller, and more powerful, it would begin to "recede into the background of our lives" - taking a more camouflaged, lifestyle-integrated form.  He called this Ubiquitous Computing (Ubicomp for short), or the age of calm technology. There have been numerous examples to support Weiser's claim, including Natalie Jeremijinko's "Live Wire" project (1995), the Ambient Orb (2002), or the Microsoft Surface Table (2007) to name just a few.

In 1997 Hiroshi Ishii expanded Weiser's idea in a seminal paper titled Tangible Bits where he examined how architectural spaces could be transformed through the coupling of digital information (bits) with tangible objects.  Where Wieser’s research aimed to make the computer ‘invisible’ by embedding smaller and smaller computer terminals into everyday objects, Ishii looked to change the way people created and interacted with digitally augmented spaces. 

Both Weiser and Ishii have had a significant impact on the development of physical computing, a term used to describe a field of research interested in the construction of physical systems that can sense and respond to their surroundings through the use of software and hardware systems. It overlaps with other forms of tangible computing (ie. ubiquitous, wearable, invisible) and incorporates both material and computational media, employing mechanical and electronic systems.

Interest in physical computing has risen dramatically over the last fifteen years in the fields of architecture, engineering, industrial design, and art. Designers in the future will be called upon to create spaces that are computationally enhanced. Rather than simply design traditional buildings and then add a computational layer, it is better to conceive and design this integration from the outset. A review of the literature reveals that there are no established methodologies for designing architectural spaces as smart or intelligent spatial systems. As such, it is clear that a new multidisciplinary approach is needed to bring together research in the fields of interaction design (IxD), architectural design, product design, human computer interaction (HCI), embedded systems, and engineering to create a holistic design strategy for more livable and productive spaces. Preparing architectural designers for these challenges demands a range of knowledge, skills, and experience well beyond the traditional domain of architectural education. This workshop in Physical Computing at the ACADIA 2011 conference is in line with the conference theme of Integration Through Computation.

Dates:

2011.October.11 | Workshop Day 1 at University of Calgary
2011.October.12 | Workshop Day 2 at University of Calgary

Software:

All students will be required to bring their own laptops preloaded with the latest versions of Rhino, Grasshopper, and Arduino. The latest build of Firefly will be provided to all workshop participants.   Trial software will also be made available.

Hardware:

Given the nature of the workshop, each student will be required to bring a small set of hardware components to begin their physical prototypes.  There are many different packages to choose from, but the following are recommended:

Starter Pack
Arduino Starter Pack or equal [includes the new Arduino Uno Atmega328, Protoboard, and a good selection of starter components]. 2 Standard Servo Motors similar to these: Adafruit or Hi-Tec from Servocity.

High-End (Recommended)
Arduino Experimentation Kit v1.0 or Sparkfun's Inventors Kit for Arduino [includes the new Arduino Uno Atmega328, Prototyping bundles, and a great selection of starter components]. 2 Standard Servo Motors similar to these: Adafruit or Hi-Tec from Servocity.

Students are encouraged to bring other components if they have them, but the packages should serve as a good starting point.

Registration:

Click here to find out more information regarding the ACADIA 2011 conference schedule.

Click here to register for the workshop.

Skylar Tibbits, Arthur van der Harten, and Steve Baer just released an excellent (and free) manual on how to get started programming in Python for Rhino 5.0.  This is a must read for anyone interested in learning how automate tasks, make decisions, perform powerful calculations and geometric manipulations using Python and the Rhino CAD environment.  Here is a small excerpt from the introduction:

"This primer is intended to teach programming to absolute beginners, people who have tinkered with programming a bit or expert programmers looking for a quick introduction to the methods in Rhino. Rhinoscript (VBscript) has been supported for many years, with a large user group and extensive support material. As well as giving a basic introduction, this primer looks to easily transition those familiar with VBscript into the world of Rhino Python.... Python offers exciting new potentials for programming in Rhino with Object-Oriented functionality, simple syntax, access to the .NET framework and a vast number of user-built libraries to extend Rhino's functionality. The same powerful methods that were previously in VBscript are still available, as well as a ton of other exciting methods and features available natively with Python."

To download the Python for Rhino 101 Primer click here.
Also, Skylar Tibbits will be hosting a 2-hour Introduction to Python webinar on July 22nd.  Skylar is a lecturer at MIT's Department of Architecture, the Founder/Principal of SJET LLC and a 2011 TED Fellow.  Click here to register for the event.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA | GRASSHOPPER & FIREFLY | JUL 11TH-22ND, 2011

Hosted by the California College of the Arts & the Architectural Association
Sponsored By McNeel Associates

I am excited to be an invited tutor for this year's Biodynamic Structures Workshop in San Francisco, CA.  Biodynamics is the study of the force and energy of dynamic processes on living organisms. Through simple mechanisms embedded within the material logic of natural systems, specific stimuli can activate a particular response. This response occurs in carnivorous plants such as the Venus fly-trap, which uses turgor pressure to trap small insects in order to feed, and worms, which by contracting differently oriented muscles, achieve movement. This ten-day intensive workshop, co-taught by the faculty of the Emergent Technologies and Design Programme at the AA and the faculty of Architecture and MEDIAlab at California College of the Arts, will explore active systems in nature, investigating biomimetic principles in order to analyze, design and fabricate prototypes that respond to electronic and environmental stimuli.

Students will work in teams to research specific biological systems, extracting logics of organization, geometry, structure and mathematics. Advanced analysis, simulation, modeling and fabrication tools will be introduced in order to apply this information to the design of both passive and active responsive architectural systems. Investigation and application of robotics, sensors and actuators will be employed for the activation of the material system investigation through the construction of working responsive prototypes.

 Click here to find out more details regarding registration or here to see images from last year's event.

I am very excited to announce that I will be working with Studio Mode in their next coLab workshop series: Hybrid Prototypes. Hybrid Prototypes is a two-day intensive design and prototyping workshop (with an optional third day) to be held in New York City during the weekend of January 08.

Description:
As architects and designers, we make things and build objects that interact with other objects, people, and networks. We strive for faster and simpler methods to build prototypes in the cheapest possible way, yet we are frequently hindered by temporal and practical factors that arise in the process of bringing our ideas to life. Firefly is the new paradigm for hybrid prototyping, offering a comprehensive set of software tools dedicated to bridging the gap between Grasshopper (a free plug-in for Rhino) and the Arduino micro-controller. It allows near real-time data flow between the digital and physical worlds – enabling the possibility to explore virtual and physical prototypes with unprecedented fluidity.

This fast-paced workshop will focus on hardware and software prototyping techniques. Using remote sensors, microcontrollers (Arduino), and actuators, we will build virtual and physical prototypes that can communicate with humans and the world around them. Through a series of focused exercises and design tasks, each attendee will make prototypes that are configurable, sensate, and active. An optional third workshop day is offered to those participants desiring further time to develop individual projects or lines of research. As part of a larger online infrastructure, modeLab, this workshop provides participants with continued support and knowledge to draw upon for future learning.

Attendance will be limited to provide each participant maximum dedicated time with instructors. Participants are encouraged to be familiar with the basic concepts of parametric design and interfaces of Grasshopper and Arduino.

Hybrid Prototypes was conceived through a collaboration between Studio Mode/modeLab and Andrew Payne/LIFT Architects/Grasshopper Primer/ Firefly.

 Instructors:
Andrew Payne | Principal, LIFT Architects | Co-Author, Grasshopper Primer | Co-Author, Firefly.
Ronnie Parsons + Gil Akos | Partners, Studio Mode.

Details:
All experience levels are welcome. Participants are encouraged to be familiar with the basic concepts of parametric design and interfaces of Grasshopper and Arduino.
Registration Pricing (limited enrollment) : $550/$650.
Workshop Location : modeLab | NYC.
Workshop Hours : 10AM-6PM.
Examples of Previous Workshops.

Infrastructure:
coLab Workbook | Printed + PDF Documentation
coLab Primers | Annotated Primer GHX Files
coLab Exercises | Annotated Exercise GHX Files
modeLab Fabrication Equipment | CNC High Force Cutter

Topics:
Arduino Micro-controller Hardware
Arduino Control Logic
Firefly Components
Parametric Design Logics
Basic Circuitry
Sensors + Actuators

Dates:
2010.December.03 | Workshop Announced + Registration Opens.
2011.January.08 | Workshop Begins.
2011.January.10 | Optional Workshop Session.

To register for the workshop, please follow this link.

I would like to extend a huge congratulations to Kichan U and his team of translators for taking on the monumental task of translating the entire 160 pages of the Grasshopper Primer (second edition) into the Korean language. A lot of hard work went into this translation and it is our hope that this work will help spread information about the Grasshopper plugin to Korea and beyond. Kichan U and his team (including Ms. Jaewon Shin) at RP Architecture Engineering & Consulting have started an online community to get feedback from Korean Grasshopper users. Feel free to visit: http://cafe.naver.com/mustbim to join in the discussion.

Source Files:
The Grasshopper Primer_Korean Edition.pdf (size: 5.6mb - right-click and select 'Save Link As' - Adobe Acrobat needed)
Primer Source Files (size: 193k - right-click and select 'Save Link As' - this is a collection of Grasshopper definitions and Rhino files needed to complete the examples in the primer)

ST. LOUIS, MO | RHINOSCRIPT, GRASSHOPPER, & FABRICATION | AUG 9TH-12TH, 2010

Hosted by Washington University in St. Louis Sam Fox School of Art and Design
Sponsored By McNeel Rhinoceros

Material Resonance will be a four day, intensive workshop focused on practical application of Rhinoscripting or Grasshopper.  The workshop will also train participants in CNC fabrication using MasterCAM and the Washington University DIL fabrication lab.  There will also be demos of the new plug-ins Firefly and Kangaroo. 

The workshop is meant for professionals or students with a working knowledge in Rhinoceros.  Prior experience with Grasshopper or Rhino VB scripting is not necessary.  The workshop will start from first principles and cover topics from tessellation, components and connections to part organization, nesting and labeling.

Instructors  
Marc Fornes _ theverymany Rhino VB scripting
Andy Payne _ LIFT Architects Grasshopper
Kenneth Tracy _ Associated Fabrication MasterCAM

For more information and to register go to:
http://samfoxschool.wustl.edu/events/workshops/3630

SAN FRANCISCO, CA | PARAMETRIC URBANISM WITH GRASSHOPPER | FEB 13-14, 2010 | 10:00am-5:00pm

I am really excited to be participating in the upcoming Formations 2010 workshop series being held at the California College of the Arts campus in San Francisco.  There is a really great lineup of instructors teaching a wide array of topics:

• Mapping Urban Information with ESRI ArcGIS by Mona El-Khafif (CCA URBANlab) and Richard Kos (CCSF GIS Education Center/ San Jose State University)
• Neocartography - an Introduction to Interactive Mapping with Flash by Sha Hwang (Stamen Design)
• Parametric Urbanism with Grasshopper by Andy Payne (Lift Architects) and Andrew Kudless (Matsys/CCA MEDIAlab)
• Sensing the City with Arduino and Processing by Jason Kelly Johnson (Future Cities Lab/CCA MEDIAlab) and TBA instructor
• Parametric Design Modeling with Revit by David Fano (Case, inc./ DesignReForm.net/Columbia GSAPP)
• ECOlogics with Ecotect by Nataly Gattegno (Future Cities Lab / CCA ECOlab) and Olivier Pennetier (Symphysis)

Below is a synopsis of the Parametric Urbanism workshop I will co-teaching with Andrew Kudless.
Instructor: Andy Payne (Lift Architects) and Andrew Kudless (Matsys/CCA MEDIAlab)

This workshop will focus on the generative modeling of urban design logics using the Grasshopper plugin for Rhino 4.0. From the early work of firms such as MVRDV to the more recent investigations by Zaha Hadid, a parametric approach to urban design has allowed designers to condense complex hierarchies of design data into solutions that exhibit highly differentiated patterns of urban form. The workshop will cover several techniques that attempt to integrate common urban design parameters dealing with massing, program, and density into one associative model allowing the designer to quickly and accurately test multiple design scenarios. The first day of the workshop will introduce many of the central topics and techniques of parametric urbanism while the second day will focus on the implementation of these techniques in a large, complex urban masterplan.

Eligibility: Open to all design students and professionals.
Cost: $100 for students, $200 for professionals.
Click here to register for this event.

ARLINGTON, TX | INTRO/INTERMEDIATE GRASSHOPPER WORKSHOP | FEBRUARY 6th, 2010 | 9:00am-6:00pm

I would like to thank Andrew Vrana, Brad Bell, and Kevin Patrick McClellan for inviting me to teach two sessions at the first ever TEX-FAB event being held at the University of Texas at Arlington School of Architecture from February 4th-6th, 2010.  The weekend event promises to be an exiciting one with key note speakers, workshops, and an exhibition planned to highlight the growing interest in digital fabrication and design.

TEX-FAB is a new resource for designers, academics, fabricators, and students seeking out the innovative application of digital technology to the physical environment. Within Texas there is an emerging network of companies, institutions, and individuals focusing on the exploration of parametric design and the digital production of building components. Specifically, there is a growing opportunity for collaborative exchange between the academic, technical, and professional communities by leveraging the immense resources found in some of the largest metropolitan centers across the United States. TEX-FAB seeks to create a forum for the exchanges of these ideas and techniques through workshops, lectures, and exhibitions.

In this video, we will walk through how to setup a Grasshopper definition that will write the G-code for surface milling on a 3-axis CNC milling machine.  When surface milling - the contouring engine is crucial.  For speed reasons, I found the C# contouring definition written by Giulio Piacentino works extremely well because it allows the user to specify a step distance (tool path offset).  After we have generated the contours (or tool paths) we can subdivide each curve, using the evaluate length component, to create a series of points which will guide the CNC mill head in order.   Because we now have data structures, we can weave formatted text strings that have been derived from the point data into a G-code that will work with the ShopBot CAM software.

As in the previous example, we have formatted our text strings to work with the opensource CAM software, Shopbot.  You can download a free version of the software here: http://www.shopbottools.com/controlsoftware.htm.

 You can also check out this video in HD after the jump.

Note: This video is for demonstration purposes only. Andrew Payne and LIFT architects will not be held responsible for any damages that might arise from using this method. Please consult your machine's operating manual before implementing this fabrication method.

In this video, I will explain how to setup a Grasshopper definition that will write the G-code for 2D shape milling on a 3-axis milling machine.  G-codes are the codes that position the tool and do the actual work, as opposed to M-codes which manages the machine.  Actually, there are a whole host of different codes that can be written to control a CNC mill, however G-codes are what we are most interested in for this definition as it will allow us to streamline our fabrication process by sending the parametric data from Grasshopper directly to a CNC mill.

In this example I will be writing the tool path information for a 2D Vornoi Pattern generator, originally written by Sang Hoon Yoon.  You can find his vornoi diagram definition on his site www.sac3.blogspot.com.  This video explains how to use your data-structure (trees) to help weave together various text strings which control how the CNC mill head will operate.

I have formated the text strings to work with the open source ShopBot CAM software.  This software is excellent for many reason, not least of which is the fact that it's free and has a large online help community... much like Grasshopper.  It also allows the user to preview the cut even if their computer isn't connected to an actual CNC mill which can come in handy while testing out your cuts.  Syntactically, ShopBot part files are setup slightly differently from traditional G-code which harkens back to the days when cutting files were stored on punched tape and it's format was optimized for brevity.  You can find a lot of helpful resources on how to setup ShopBot part files in their Programming Handbook. 

You can check out this video in HD after the jump.

Note: This video is for demonstration purposes only.  Andrew Payne and LIFT architects will not be held responsible for any damages that might arise from using this method.  Please consult your machine's operating manual before implementing this fabrication method.