Digital Design Media: Tools for Design Exploration in the Studio Process

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1 Digital Design Media: Tools for Design Exploration in the Studio Process Magdalini-Eleni (Magdalena) Pantazi Architect Part-time Instructor, Boston Architectural College (BAC), Tel: Fax: SYNOPSIS This paper discusses the integration of digital technology in the studio process as a tool for design exploration. I examine current design methodologies as employed at the Boston Architectural College (BAC), discuss the division between analog and digital media in the studio setting, and propose new ways of combining these to address the apparent difficulty students have when moving from 2- to 3-dimensional compositions. The area of interest is that of the early stage of design education, i.e. the first semester foundation studios in both graduate and undergraduate level (Master s A and A-1) at the BAC. Since one of the principal goals of these studios is to master students 3- dimensional thinking, digital media are currently addressed as an additional and complementary step towards 3-dimensional form investigation. 1_Introduction Creative fields are characterized by the generation and manufacture of objects for reflection and evaluation. Donald Schon 1 Architectural design can be perceived as a conversation between the designer s thoughts and the object under construction, conducted with the aid of a design medium. The goal of this conversation is to develop a representation that can most accurately illustrate the designer s thoughts, while at the same time, as Donald Schon suggested, to leave enough space for further investigation and exploration. This is not an easy task, since the nature of design does not support linear connections between the world of ideas and the actual design world. The only tangible tool architects have to handle the above condition is a variety of design media that helps them examine, evaluate and explore a design idea. Similarly, in the field of architectural design education, multiple design media, analog and digital ones, are integrated in the curricula in order to best equip design students. The usefulness of the different media though, their value in design and the extent of their integration in academic curricula are issues still under discussion. 1

2 Digital technologies have been used in architectural design education for over two decades, however, the degree of their integration in academic curricula varies significantly between different schools of architecture. With the opportunities technology offers to the design process still under evaluation 2, many students continue to use CAD only as a drafting tool in the final stage of design exploration and not as a tool for design investigation. My hypothesis is that this limited use of CAD is a result of how digital technology classes are typically integrated in curricula, and consequently how CAD is introduced to students. Since most architectural curricula were based on traditional methodologies that focused on the perceptual link between hand and pencil drawing, the first use of digital technologies was as a complimentary, but not fundamental, tool. Furthermore, the potentials of the new tool for design were not fully addressed as the teaching methodologies employed in the digital media classes mimicked the ones used in analog ones. Although the process of making drawings by hand and the process of making drawings in a computer seem alike, they are characterized by a major difference, as Ivan Sutherland first discovered back at 1960 s: computer drawings require from the designer to describe their exact structure and provide sets of rules from which the drawings derive. On the other hand, a drawing produced by hand is not characterized by such an inherent structure and does not follow a specific set of rules but freely evolves. Treating these two different processes with similar methodologies limits the capabilities of the digital tools. As a result, existing curricula still have trouble identifying and exploiting the relationship between digital media and design exploration. BAC s curriculum is among the many characterized by the above condition: although digital technology classes form a basic part of the curriculum, their teaching seems separated from the design studio classes. This paper suggests that the above is one of the main reasons why students find it hard to make the necessary connection between digital media and design investigation. To support this argument, I first present the theoretical background on the different properties of analog and digital media and how they influence design exploration. I then discuss the methodologies employed at the BAC s 1 st year courses (studio and computer aided design courses) through examples of students work. Finally, 2

3 I present some thoughts on possible ways of integrating digital media in the studio setting to enhance design exploration. 2_Analog and Digital Media As soon as the process of computer aided design is considered as building a computerized description of the object being designed rather than as the process of drawing the object being designed, horizons become tremendously expanded. Ivan Sutherland 3 One of the most challenging aspects of the architectural design process is the coordination and codification of the available design information for the creation of a single design solution. To succeed into this goal architects use all the design media available to them and examine various aspects of their design. For many centuries, analog media, i.e. pencil, paper, ruler, perspective/axonometric drawing, physical models etc. have been the ones that architects used so as to understand and codify the design problem information. Around 1963, though, computer-based design media were introduced into design with the creation by pioneer Ivan Sutherland of sketchpad (Figure 1), an innovative computer program that introduced a new way of interaction between man and design through the use of a machine. Since then, digital media have been gradually introduced to architectural design practice and education, to the point where their use today is widespread. Unfortunately, the introduction of the new digital media in architecture was not followed by a thorough examination of its properties and special characteristics. Instead, the new media were used in tandem with existing techniques, ones previously developed for use in analog media. Digital media, though, involve the use computer; a machine that is structured and operates in specific way. Applying conventional techniques to media that involve different logic, inherent by the medium itself, limits the use of the medium and bounds its potentials for design. The goal of the paper is then to provide insight on the way analog and digital tools can be used more effectively in the early stage of design education. For this purpose, I begin with an analysis of the different processes these tools impose on the designer and the impact these have on design. 3

4 2.1_Design Processes Imposed by Analog and Digital Media In the past thirty years, the extensive utilization of digital media in architecture was followed by the emergence of the term computation, which was used to express the processes that take place inside the computer. Computation describes the act of combining symbols according to certain rules so that it proposes an inherently systematic way of approaching design. Problems are solved in a finite number of steps through the use of algorithms, that is through finite set of rules or operations that are unambiguous and easy to follow. 4 Such operations could be also prescribed for an architect designing simply with pencil and paper, and so would still constitute an algorithm, i.e. a computational process. The use of a computer to execute an algorithm is favored, however, due to two main advantages that relate to time-saving: results are quickly produced and variations can be rapidly tested. This advantage of saving time led architects to adopt both computational processes and computers in design. Today, computational processes are extensively used in design, but more so in its later phase: the production of construction documents or representation of the final product. In fact, computational processes are scarcely used in the early design phase that describes the designer s actions from the introduction to the design problem, through the exploration of the possible solution alternatives and their transformations, to the crystallization of a first satisfying design result. A basic feature of the architectural design process at this early stage is its undefined and unclear character: in seeking design solutions, designers seem to proceed in a rather ad hoc way 5 that obfuscates the establishment of systematic methods of approaching the design problems. This in turn hinders the use of digital media and favors the use of analog ones in the primary design phase. Architects are practically required to use ad hoc design processes since they need to respond to two unclear but fundamental design conditions: the undefined character of the design problem and the ambiguous nature of the design process, the process that informs and guides architects actions. 6 Following the above discussion, it has been natural to identify two different types of design processes: ad hoc and computational. Ad hoc processes are based on the designer s intuition, support the use of implicit actions, and so are mostly supported by analog media. Computational processes, on the other hand, demand precision, are based 4

5 on very explicit rules and so are favored by digital media. Each one of these processes impose a different way of codifying the design information, of describing the object under construction and consequently of perceiving it. In that respect, the decision of selecting one of the two processes to work with may have a great impact on the final design outcome. As Ivan Sutherland mentioned back in 1975, The usefulness of computer drawings is precisely their structured nature and this structured nature is precisely the difficulty in making them 7. During the conceptual phase, for example, a design component may carry various meanings and could be interpreted in many different ways: a line may signify a wall, a groove on the ground, a division between two spaces or a direction. But ambiguity is conspicuously absent from design when it is computer aided, even in the basic case where designs are given in line drawings 8. Sutherland argued that because pencil and paper have no inherent structure, they can be decomposed and manipulated in any manner of interest to the designer. An evolving design may thus have alternative descriptions that may change from time to time in unanticipated ways. The structure of the computer design, on the other hand, presents an obstacle to all this, because it is fixed in specific design operations. The description of the design thus becomes a crucial issue. Computers demand a clear and explicit description of the design, that is a definition of a vocabulary of units and a set of rules that determines their relationships. Defining units signifies that specific meanings are attached to them, which automatically excludes other possible meanings that they could have in a different context. While this could be the case for a fixed design solution, i.e. the end design product, it cannot apply to the designs produced during the early phases where meaning constantly changes. Instead, it is vital at these phases to use design media and processes that support vague and implicit design descriptions that allow design reinterpretation to occur. While analog media support implicit descriptions, the question of whether digital ones could provide the ground for them is still open. The answer to this question becomes extremely important, especially for design educators. They are the ones that, not only expose students to the ideas, notions and principles of design, but also teach them how to translate these ideas into space through the use of different media. Knowing the capabilities and potential of each tool as well as 5

6 the processes that each one imposes on design will help students to better understand and handle design complexity, which will give them ways to enhance design exploration. 3_Boston Architectural College (BAC): Methodologies employed at 1 st year courses. Digital technologies were introduced in the Boston Architectural College s academic curricula two decades ago. The relationship, however, of these classes with the design studio classes still are separated. Students are obliged to attend computer aided design classes from their first semester, and at the same time they are discouraged to use this knowledge in the studio setting. Being at the position of teaching both design studio classes and computer aided design ones, I made certain observation on the nature of the problematic relationship of these two courses. I will present them through a short description of the courses context and examples of student work. 3.1_Foundation Studio courses One of the principal goals of the foundation studios (Master s A and A1) that first year students have to attend is to enhance the students three-dimensional thinking through exercises that focus on the translation from two to three dimensions. During this exploration, students employ traditional methods such as sketching, collage, drawing (axonometric, isometric), and physical modeling, while they are discouraged to use digital technologies. Figure 1 shows the work produced for Project 1:Translations in 2 and 3 Dimensions during a 6 week period. Typically students start from a two dimensional composition, where they explore spatial relationships through the design principles of symmetry, rhythm, hierarchy etc. The design media used at this phase are collages and sketches. Students are then asked to explore the spatial potential of the various elements represented in their two-dimensional compositions in three-dimensional space. Students explore how a point can become a line and a plane a mass through the construction of physical models. Students further explore their design ideas through orthogonal drawings and axonometrics. 6

7 Figure 1: Master s A Studio Project Work_Student: Travis Farncombe Analog media do indeed enhance design exploration and help students to understand the transformation of two- to three-dimensional space. At the same time, though, they suffer from certain limitations. For example, the effective communication of three-dimensional ideas through sketching depends on having developed an adequate skill set, which first year students do not typically possess. Similarly, axonometric representations of three-dimensional objects are still only two-dimensional visual hacks, while physical models usually engage a bird s-eye view which does not have the impact that a human viewpoint affords. Further, drawings and physical models can also be extremely time consuming, so that students often end up spending a disproportionate amount of time on the drawing or physical model itself, rather on the development and in-depth exploration of their design idea. 3.2_Computer Aided Design Courses During the first year of design studies, students at the BAC have to attend a number of Computer Aided Design courses (AutoCAD, Rhinoceros, Sketch-up) so as to gain a basic knowledge on digital technologies. These classes introduce students to the basic concepts and operations of the different software through hands-on assignments. 7

8 For their final project, students are usually asked to document an existing building or a previous studio composition (Figure 2, documentation of studio composition). Figure 2: Computer Aided Design Course(Rhino 4)._Student: Craig Souza In this context digital media are mainly used as representational tools, to document the final stage of a completed design project. Little discussion is happening around the use of digital media as tools for design investigation. Students are using the digital tool to execute operations similar to the ones they perform with analog ones, i.e. extrusions. The opportunities digital design environment offers for design exploration (construction and manipulation of complex shapes, absence of gravity, calculation of many parameters), remain unexploited. For that reason students are unable to make the connections and use the tool to enhance their spatial thinking and end up using the tool merely to represent their final products. 8

9 4_Integration of Digital Media in the Studio Setting There is no such thing as teaching, only the respectful witness of other people s learning. Tina Blythe 9 The early phase of architectural design education is extremely important for students as it describes their first contact with creative design and shapes their spatial thinking. Being responsible for teaching studio and computer aided design courses at first year students at the BAC, gave me the opportunity to closely observe their learning processes and more specifically to study how these processes were influenced by different design media. These observations, described in the previous section, shaped some thoughts, in regards to the way digital technologies could be integrated into the academic curricula so as to support creative design. Analog and digital design media form representational tools that help students to express their design ideas. Although, the properties of these media differ, their value in design exploration is similar; they both provide ways to examine different aspects of the object under construction and thus enhance design investigation. For that reason they should be equally incorporated in the studio setting. Students need all the available design tools, to express their ideas, explore their designs and examine different aspects of them. Excluding digital technologies from early studio courses affects design investigation in two fundamental ways: (i) students are unable to make the necessary connections between digital media and design investigation, since, as explained previously, digital media are usually taught to be used as drafting tools and not as exploration tools, and (ii) the challenging subject of translating two- to three- dimensional space and vice versa is limited to the description that only analog tools offer. Although, there are clear advantages in incorporation digital design media in the early studio courses, there is a great number of educators that still condemn their integration. They argue that since digital media demand clear and explicit processes and rules, they could easily turn design into a mechanical process. I argue that this threat of mechanization of design could be avoided, if we first understand the different processes that the new tool impose in design and secondly if our design educational methods use rules that are not solid and explicit. Protocol analysis studies 10 on this field have shown 9

10 that this is a realistic scenario; they presented computational models which involve rules that do not describe the exact characteristics of the object under construction, but rather offer a qualitative description of it. They proved that rules can involve more than concrete descriptions of a situation; they can as well refer to general descriptions without loosing their significance and power. Digital media, therefore, could be introduced in the studio setting through computational processes characterized by rules that do not define the specific properties of the object under construction, but rather describe its general spatial relationships. To conclude, I believe that digital technologies need to be integrated at the early stages of architectural design education, aiming to enhance design exploration. Taking into consideration the peculiar properties of the processes digital media impose in design and introducing techniques that respect and detect them, will bridge the digital division in architectural education and allow students the opportunity to better utilize CAD as part of their design problem-solving toolkit. 10

11 1 Donald Schon and Glen Wiggins. Kinds of Seeing and their function in Design. D S13 (1992): Cameron Campbell. Digital Design Pedagogy. Setting the Foundation for Digital Design in the Architecture Curriculum. ACADIA 2006 (2006): Rivka Oxman. Digital architecture as a challenge for design pedagogy: theory, knowledge, models and medium. DS 29(2008): Jane Burry. Mindful Spaces: Computational Geometry and the Conceptural Spaces in which Designers Operate. Int. JAC 05(2007)4: Ivan Sutherland. Structure in Drawings and the Hidden-Surface Problem. (New York: Petrocelli, 1975). 4 (McGill, 2001). 5 Nigel Cross. Designerly Ways of Knowing. (London: Springer, 2006). 6 Magdalini-Eleni Pantazi. Dissecting Design: Exploring the Role of Rules in the Design Process. (Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2008), p Ivan Sutherland. Structure in Drawings and the Hidden-Surface Problem. (New York: Petrocelli, 1975). 8 Ivan Sutherland. Structure in Drawings and the Hidden-Surface Problem. (New York: Petrocelli, 1975). 9 Tina Blythe, comment in class AS7400: Teaching for Understanding, fall Magdalini-Eleni Pantazi. Dissecting Design: Exploring the Role of Rules in the Design Process. (Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2008), p.118 References Burry, Jane. Mindful Spaces: Computational Geometry and the Conceptural Spaces in which Designers Operate. International Journal of Architectural Computing 05 (2007)4: Campbell, Cameron. Digital Design Pedagogy. Setting the Foundation for Digital Design in the Architecture Curriculum. ACADIA 2006 Conference Proceedings. Synthetic Landscapes, (2006): Cross, Nigel. Designerly Ways of Knowing. London: Springer, Lawson, Bryan. How designers think. Oxford: Elsevier, Oxman, Rivka. Digital architecture as a challenge for design pedagogy: theory, knowledge, models and medium. Design Studies 29, (2008): Pantazi, Magdalini-Eleni. Dissecting Design: Exploring the Role of Rules in the Design Process. Master of Science Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Cambridge, MA: MIT, Schon, Donald and Wiggins, Glen. Kinds of Seeing and their function in Design. Design Studies vol.13 (1992): Stiny, George. Shapes. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, Sutherland, Ivan. Structure in Drawings and the Hidden-Surface Problem. Reflections on Computer Aids to Design and Architecture. New York: Petrocelli,