Texas Tech University College of Architecture

DIGITAL MEDIA I

ARCH 1353Spring 2011Instructor: Rob DiazCoordinator: Maria R. PerbelliniTAs: Kyle Meeks, Will Denman, Christopher Davis, Jose Sanchez

COURSE INFORMATIONCatalogue description:1353. Digital Media I - Prerequisite: AutoCAD. An introduc-tion to the use of the computer as a design drawing tool with an emphasis on conceptual knowledge and computing skills for design communication. Levels: Undergraduate - TTU Credits: 3 semester credit hours

NAAB STUDENT PERFORMANCE CRITERIA 2009A.3 Visual Communication Skills: Ability to use appropriate representational media,such as traditional graphic and digi-tal technology skills, to convey essential formal elements at each stage of the programming and design process.

COURSE OVERVIEWThe course intent is to develop the ability to use representa-tional tools and methods. Students are exposed to effective visual communication strategies using arrange of media, such as analog and digital drawings and graphics, to sup-port each stage of the design process. The first stage of this course introduces a general knowledge about images made of pixels: type, size, resolution and all those basics informa-tion that are necessary to acquire in order to be efficient with graphics. The second stage of the course focuses on the use of Adobe Photoshop. Students learn about how to manipulate and edit pixel-images. They work with a full set of actions involved with reiteration,transformation, editing, filtering and layering. The history of all these applications must be documented graphically. The third stage explores vectors and diverse ways to deal with lines and drawings.

Students implements all the features of Adobe Illustra-tor, including files export techniques from other programs (Photoshop,AutoCAD) and text features. The fourth stage goes more in depth on layout and additional graphical appli-cations using Adobe-In-Design, instrumental for giving to the students more proficiency in their portfolio representation and organization. Students work on weekly assignments.

COURSE STRUCTUREThe course is designed to work both as the supporting course associated withARCH 1411, Architectural Design Studio I, and as a “stand alone” course.Students apply the course digital knowledge and tools on their studio design process, in order to be efficient and well prepared on graphical representations. Guided by the in-structor and the coordinator, the section assistants will be responsible for every in-class aspect of their particular sec-tion of this course: from taking attendance, to assignment delivery, to assessment. A typical class day will include any-thing from a program related presentation, a discussion of an assigned reading, to a review of completed work. Each section meets nominally for two hours each week at des-ignated times. The section assistants will have two hours a week of regular office hours for students in their section. A student with a median skill and acumen level should require 9 hours of study a week outside class to successfully com-plete the coursework.

table of contentsintro.........................

pixel + grid...............

a collage..................

vectors expressions.

inner + connective...

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d i g i t a l m e d i a | 01 a design studio production | www. d m 1 - i m a g i n e . b l o g s p o t . c o m

introDigital Media...

...is a course that explores the potentials in systems and forms that generate from pre-existing conditions from pragmatic ideas. The initial phase of the course embarks on parameterized systems where geometry conforms to a set of rules through a kit-of-parts. This critical thinking process begins to stimulate the artist and viewer’s mind as a guided series to articulate an expression or idea. This begins the journey not as a simple 2D abstract but as a means to understand form and space as a magnetism between the oppos-ing and the norm.

Further studies reveal that geometries emerge from multi-faceted arenas regardless of their origi-nal intent or statue. The art expressed in this book determine how geometries interact with an existing condition or controlled. In an pre-existing condition, elements through variable elements can merge into one another as a means of connectivity or abstract

surrealism. Forms emerge not as a coincidence of the time or space, but as a dependent result of the derived system of the latter. In a controlled sys-tem, the user can manipulate several elements that could develop into a new vernacular idea or series of geometries that unify the elements into a connective assemble. Geometries in this discourse play a criti-cal role, determining how all things (alike or not) can cohere to a complex world of form and space. This begins the critical thinking process where lines and objects do more than mediate a function, the deliver the whole.

- Rob Diaz

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Assignment 1 explores the tectonic assemblies of pixel and grid. This process is the develop-able form that all images follow regardless of their parameters. Pixels are everywhere. We sometimes forget that pixels are the reason why we see images on digital display monitors. This exercise explores that reality by investi-gating the natural order of a pixel and its rela-tionship to the grid.

The idea is based on the simple order of or-thonogonal originality of grids and pxiels. The grid forms the parametric orders where the void spaces become the active cubonic device that illustrates the next phases of visualization through color and texture. The edge definition from this experiment from overlay orders to displacement and transformation will attain a spatial reality from one relationship to another as images get more complex.

Pixel + Grid

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A picture can host several different events, ob-jects, environments, and so on. This particular assignment will examine how these pictures formulate a relationship with the prescribed object and its connectiveness with each seg-ment the object inherits. This is an assessment of detail and arrangement of photos for a type of collage/photomontage. This process will explore how certain qualities of the image can play a role in arrangement and connection to the next image or images. Certain aspects of the image such as straight-edge conditions or linear projections can help develop the collage so that each image has a connected relation-ship to the next.

a Collage

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by Sonya Shah

An exploration of collages and vector lines. The purpose is to understand the general con-cept of a lineweights through extraction and abstraction of profile and shadow lines. This is a two part assignment because the first part will entail a collage of a building in persepctive view and then by the general concept of the building delivered in a vector-base output com-position.

The vector exploration is the examining of how vector lines and simple geometry can play a significant role in any composition. Lines help illustrate an image or detail drawing as a visual representation. Geometry is just about every-where and thing we see, touch, and feel. Lines help provoke a system whole into a complex or simple series of vectors that emerge into geo-metric shapes.

Vectors Expressions

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architect | Frank Lloyd Wrightarchitecture collageFalling Water |

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When you draw a line from a point to another point, you begin to articulate a certain dialogue between space and moment. This variance between the two points can illustrate a unique system that is governed by a set of rules or-dained by the director. When the line continues to expand from its origin, it begins to transpire into a new order, delivered by a degree or a juxtaposition of other lines. As lines begin to meet one another, intersections are explored as vertices where a object or shape emerges.

This study will investigate the potentiality of ge-ometries as a fundamental emergence of two or three basic geometries selected by the user. The geometric shapes will determine the direct order but the user will take the few lines that emerge from the shape as a radiancy transpir-ing selection that will interact with its neigh-boring segments and connect with opposing systems. The idea is to explore the geometries that emerge from the inner-connective seg-ments as they meet with each other and ex-

iNNER + connective

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statementThe initial transition of geometries along the path begin the articulate a dialogue between the moment of its movement to the final rest-ing position, if one is negated. The gradual change in size and rotation determine a relationship between lines and form where new geom-etries emerge. Extended lines from the original component intersect one another a precise moments regulated by a series of rules that reveal certain geometries that may not exceed a limited parameter of 6 sides. The nature of this transition from lines to geometry is articulate because the number of lines that radiate from the geometry prede-termine how the overall geometric crystals will develop.

The end result resembles some-what of “broken glass” where lines intersect and one or another mo-ment, creating a inter-woven idea of forms. There isn’t a real pattern that emerges except for what was deter-mined from the transitional transfig-uration momentum. As one merges these systems on each other, a se-ries of 2D manipulations further ex-plored reveal a certain “depth-ness” to the composition, especially as transparencies begin to play a role. This composition then begins to embark what appears to be a chaos stratum but is actually a selected series of systems that dance on the canvas, enforcing a type of depen-dency on the other.