In this publication, Greg Lynn and Wolf Prix discuss Coop Himmelb(l)au’s BMW Welt, a corporate-event and car-delivery centre whose iconic form was realized with sophisticated structural analysis and visualization software. The project is located on the BMW campus in Munich, near the Olympic Park; among other corporate functions, it offers the opportunity for new BMW owners to learn more about their cars before driving them away from within the building itself. The design extends Prix’s interest in a cloud-like architecture without ties to the ground. Anchored in one corner by a twisting “double cone” made of nearly nine hundred unique steel ...

The second in the Studies in the Design Laboratory epub series produced by the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and the CCA, this publication traces the development of complex computational geometry in the work of Ron Resch. Resch’s strikingly novel generative methods laid the seeds of computational origami, and during the early 1970’s he collaborated in the pioneering computer science department of the University of Utah, a hotbed of early computer graphics. Featuring interviews with Resch’s collaborators, excerpts from his remarkable films, and a consideration of the role of the architect in cross-disciplinary laboratories, this epub argues for Resch ...

Designing the Computational Image, Imagining Computational Design is an exhibition showcasing rare photographs, film, high-quality reproductions, and interactive software reconstructions examining the formative period of numerical control and Computer-Aided Design technologies, along with a selection of experimental work by computational designers working today.

A conference on drawing in a world in which architecture is almost entirely based on computation might seem something of a paradox. Less than 30 years ago, the appearance of new software, first in engineering companies and then in architectural practices, triggered a debate about the changing nature of architectural drawing and about how what was previously drawn was becoming standardised and normalised through a singular language, a common identity and, perhaps most controversially, a normative creativity. Today, all architects work with programmes such as AutoCAD, Autodesk and Catia, and their projects conform to recognised standards of digital modelling and ...

The Hershey fonts are a collection of vector fonts developed c. 1967 by Dr. Allen Vincent Hershey at the Naval Weapons Laboratory, originally designed to be rendered using vectors on early cathode ray tube displays. Decomposing curves to connected straight lines allowed Hershey to produce complex typographic designs. In their original form the font data consists simply of a series of coordinates, meant to be connected by straight lines on the screen. SIL Open Font License

Computer simulations are omnipresent media in today’s knowledge production. For scientific endeavors such as the detection of gravitational waves and the exploration of subatomic worlds, simulations are essential; however, the epistemic status of computer simulations is rather controversial as they are neither just theory nor just experiment. Therefore, computer simulations have challenged well-established insights and common scientific practices as well as our very understanding of knowledge. This volume contributes to the ongoing discussion on the epistemic position of computer simulations in a variety of physical disciplines, such as quantum optics, quantum mechanics, and computational physics. Originating from an interdisciplinary event, it ...

The first in the Studies in the Design Laboratory epub series produced by the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and the CCA, this publication finds an origin of computational design in the work of Ralph Knowles at the Natural Forces Laboratory at the University of Southern California, beginning in 1967. It features interviews with Knowles, a selection of images of solar studies carried out at the laboratory, and analysis of the laboratory’s work, with emphasis on the heliodon and solar envelope projects.

Bernard Cache is the principal of the Paris-based practice Objectile – which he founded in 1996 with Patrick Beaucé – and a noted theorist of geometry and computational ontology. He formulated his concept of ‘non-standard architecture’ in his 1995 book Earth Moves: The Furnishing of Territories, a concept that was given the name ‘objectile’ by Gilles Deleuze in his book on the philosopher Leibniz, The Fold. This collection of ten essays brings together a number of key texts by Cache. These include his 1999 ‘Plea for Euclid’ and more recent writing commissioned especially for this collection, including ‘Vitruvius Machinator Terminator’.

The 38 texture maps included in Three Digs A Skull were created by photo-modeling software. The maps are used to add photorealistic surface information to web-based 3D models scanned by different users. They are produced by an algorithm and meant to be parsed by modeling software, but not seen by humans. As such, their aesthetic is non-intentional. Each visitor to tex-archive.com activates a search for a new texture map, which is then presented, archived, and posted to twitter at @tex_archive (where it is cataloged by the Library of Congress). By retrieving these images the texture maps are removed from their normal operation ...