Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
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2
May
2010
Union Square
A while ago I put up a photo of the station entrances that I had a play with when I was working at Aedas. This is a picture I came across of one of the Union Square station entrance that I worked on too.
I really should go to Dubai and see what all the fuss is about.
29
Apr
2010
Nature by numbers
This is well worth watching in full screen!
24
Apr
2010
architects’ pay?
I’ve just posted this on one of the discussion pages of the Facebook group Architects against low pay.
It’ll probably get shot down as a load of neo-con rubbish, but this is one of the few topics that gets me really animated.
I think that it is fairly clear that anyone can design a building (here’s an example).
I think that a much more pertinent question would be ‘can anyone design a building well?’
This is a much more difficult issue. An absolute base level of competence is mandated by the building regulations, and then any value that a client derives from the designer of their building is a bonus.
I don’t think I could disagree more strongly with protection of the role of architects. Architects are currently (theoretically) well trained individuals, who should be able to deliver a service (designing a building) competently. When I wasn’t so bald I would get my hair cut at by hairdresser; during the process of cutting my hair we would often discuss the three years of training they had undergone to become a hairdresser. I’ve never asked to see a hairdresser’s certification, I have always been happy that their past record of cutting hair well is feeding them, and therefore they must be good enough. If I liked them I would go back again. If I was getting a particularly important haircut (maybe I’m going to be made prime minister) but I’ve never seen the work of this particular hairdresser I might ask to see some photos of previous work, or even talk to some previous clients.
To cut hair one needn’t be a part of any professional organisation. Membership of one might however add more credence to their skills, but there is no formal requirement.
If there were governmental hair cutting requirements, then if I got a non-compliant haircut, then I would have a way of seeking some recompense for my terrible bouffant. If the hairdresser was not a member of the professional organisation then in future I might tend towards using registered cutters.
The point that I’m inelegantly trying to make here is about choice and freedom. By mandating that only an architect is able to do certain things, you remove the choices of people who want to engage someone to do those things. What this means is the now there is no reason to choose an architect over a non architect as there aren’t any non architects. Therefore the name ‘architect’ no longer attracts a premium.
I’ve ranted at length about this before, and if pushed I’d be happy to again, but in a nutshell the argument goes:
By removing the legislation around who is allowed to design buildings, and increasing the requirement on the performance* then clients will naturally gravitate to whoever is BETTER at designing buildings.
If we continue to cultivate an ivory tower, then there is a good chance that the tower will stay where it is, and everyone else will have moved on.
*many metrics, cabe does quite a good job on the design quality side, but building regs need to be more stringent
10
Apr
2010
UK emissions attributable to the built environment?
I’m trying to write about how much the built environment contributes to UK CO2 emissions, and i’m finding it to be very murky.
There is a figure of about 47 to 50%-ish but nobody references where they got this from, and nobody then subdivides it to show what that is made up of.
I’m on the bus at the moment, so i don’t really have access to the figures, but agriculture gets a big chunk, as does electricity generation, cement manufacturing gets a chunk, and transport gets a bit, and then the rest is left to ‘the built environment’.
As far as I can tell, if it has a roof, it is built environment. This means that that 50% that gets attributed to “something that architects really should be doing something about” includes everything from all the computers in offices around the country, to aluminium smelters (which consume so much electricity that they often have their own power station!).
What I’m after is the percentage of UK CO2 emissions that are attributable to buildings, broken down into useful chunks. How much power does the building consume? To run the lifts, the HVAC, the lights?
There are a lot of grey areas here, like how much architects should get involved with specifying the IT infrastructure, so that it produces less heat, and therefore allows a reduction in cooling loads, but for the moment I just want simple numbers.
Does anyone have anything they can push my way? There’s a pint/mars bar in it for you!!
8
Apr
2010
Teaching texture mapping
This seems like a great way to teach texturing. People often struggle to start using UVW maps, and it is probably because it is a pretty unintuitive thing to do. We don’t skin animals much any more, and not many novelty Christmas jumpers are knitted so putting skins back on is even less likely.
This diy toy kit lets people make something, and hold it in their hands, and then put it back into the computer a few times until it is perfect.
Take a look at the archive, there are hundreds!
I have a feeling that once you’d made a couple of these then you’d have a good grasp of how to unfold wonder woman to put an awesome tattoo of an eagle on her thigh.
It might even build into a bigger teaching scheme for animation, camera matching, compositing. Anything…