Generating the Eden Project using Solid Edge, Sketchup and Rhino Grasshopper

The Eden Project is composed of a number of geodesic domes. These domes are made out of hundreds of hexagons.

I first used Solid Edge to draw the outlines of the volumes. Then I imported the data into Sketchup to take advantage of the Soap Skin and Bubble plugin to create the bubble form. Finally, I imported the model into Rhino Grasshopper and used a script to generate the hexagonal structure.

First presentation: http://designinterfaces.blogspot.com/2010/02/solid-edge-nx.html

Remodelling Eyebeam Institute using RhinoGrasshopper & Autodesk Inventor, Shi Xinyu

The Eyebeam facility in Chelsea will be the city's first institution dedicated exclusively to new media art and the largest institution of its kind in the United States.The spatial logic of the proposed building is based on a simple premise: a pliable ribbon that locates production (atelier) to one side and presentation (museum/theater) to the other.
Generally, for me, there are two remarkable features that I could learn a lot from this particular architecture. First, the relationship between the ribbon envelope and the two different spaces (Production & Presentation); how the ribbon’s folding and wrapping represents the spatial quality and requirement of the two different spaces. Second, the icon ribbon itself, how it folding and changing directions fluidly, creating a fluid object to connect different spaces, not only from the function and construction point of view, but also from aesthetic point of view.

Rhino Grasshopper:
The relationship between the ribbon envelope and the two different spaces (Production & Presentation). Therefore, I decided to use rhino + grasshopper to remodel this first stage, because, as we all know, grasshopper is a popular and powerful parametric rhino plug-ins, which is based on the logic of relationships between different objects. Therefore, it’s perfect to be used here to define the relationship between the ribbon envelope and wrapped spaces.

Autodesk Inventor:
The icon ribbon itself, how it folding and changing directions fluidly, creating a fluid object to connect different spaces. Therefore, I chose Autodesk inventor to remodel the second stage, because, Autodesk Inventor is professional tools for sheet metal modeling, which has powerful metal sheet bending tools. Therefore, it’s also perfect to be used here to create the fluid icon ribbon.

First presentation posts:
http://designinterfaces.blogspot.com/2009/11/bim.html

Re-Modeling Esplanade Theatres using Rhino Grasshopper and Sketchup7

The Esplanade Theatres on the Bay is located in the island nation of Singapore.Esplanade Theatres on the Bay is a riverbank building which is positioned on 6 hectares of prime riverside land along the Marina Bay near the mouth of the Singapore River. The Esplanade Theatres on the Bay in Singapore was constructed purposely to be the centre for performing arts in the city with a diverse culture. It was designed by two architectural firms working in conjunction: by DP Architects (DPA) of Singapore and the London-based Michael Wilford & Partners (MWP),The unique architectural design has been said to have an appearance similar to either a durian (a tropical fruit) or the eyes of a fly. Many Singaporeans casually refer to the Esplanade as "The Durian".

This is the first time I use grasshopper and soap bubble tool. From the beginning, I research the architecture and analyse which software is better to remodel it.Then learn the software the blog.Although the model looks like very difficult,there
are many components,after remodeling,I understand use grasshopper to model it is not easy.It is a good chance to learn the two software grasshopper and sketchup7.

first presentation:
http://designinterfaces.blogspot.com/2009/12/alias-studio-tools_14.html

Re-Modeling Nakagin Capsule Tower by using Rhino Grasshopper and Sketchup 7

Discription:
The Nakagin Capsule Tower designed by Kisho Kurokawa and located in Shimbashi, Tokyo.The Tower was composed by prefabric capsules.Those capsules in different positionsof the tower have different altitudes.The altitudes are relating to the positions of platforms in the traffic core, which combine with those prefabric units.And most of the orientations of capsules were fixed in existing building ,only those capsules in the corner of each tower have uncertained orientations.

To re-modeling and generating the nakagin capsule tower ,I firstly studied the interesting building logic of Kisho Kurokawa.I conclude the idea of matabolism is qute faciniting .Although the tower looks very complicated, but the logic is quite clear and easy. Therefore ,with the clear and easy logic , the model could be generated and modeled quickly by several simple operations of grasshopper and sketchup 7.

Re-Modeling the Nakagin Capsule Tower using Rhino Grasshopper, Sketchup7 and ArchiCAD, Sun Ke

Re-Modeling the Nakagin Capsule Tower using Rhino Grasshopper and SketchUp 7

Re-Modeling the Eden Project using Rhino Grasshopper and Autocad 2010

Project description:
The Eden Project is a visitor attraction in the United Kingdom, including the world's largest greenhouse. The complex comprises a number of domes that house plant species from around the world, each dome emulating a natural biome. The domes are made out of hundreds of hexagons plus a few pentagons that connect the whole construction; each of these is a transparent cushion made of tough plastic. The first dome emulates a tropical environment, the second a warm temperate, Mediterranean environment.

The project was conceived by Tim Smit and designed by architect Nicholas Grimshaw and engineering firm Anthony Hunt and Associates . Davis Langdon carried out the project management, Sir Robert McAlpine and Alfred McAlpine did the construction and MERO designed and built the biomes. Land Use Consultants led the masterplan and landscape design. The project took 2½ years to construct and opened to the public on 17 March 2001.

Used software:
- Autodesk AutoCad 2010® has managed to add a host of new features and capabilities to its flagship product. But while last year the new ribbon-bar user interface overshadowed a relatively short list of new capabilities, this time around AutoCAD 2010 offers some incredibly powerful new functionality for both 2D and 3D users (incl. New Parametric Drawing Tools, Dynamic blocks, Organic 3D Modeling - 3D solid, 3D mesh, 3D surfaces, 3D faces, polygon meshes, polyface meshes, regions, Smooth Object tool etc.)
- Rhinoceros® is a stand-alone, commercial nurbs-based 3D-modeling tool, developed by Robert McNeel & Associates.Like many modeling applications, Rhino also features a scripting language based on the Visual Basic language, and an SDK that allows reading and writing Rhino files directly. Rhinoceros 3d gained its popularity in architectural design in part because of the Grasshopper plug-in for computational design.
- For designers who are exploring new shapes using generative algorithms, Grasshopper® is a graphical algorithm editor tightly integrated with Rhino’s 3-D modeling tools. Unlike RhinoScript, Grasshopper requires no knowledge of programming or scripting, but still allows designers to build form generators from the simple to the awe-inspiring.


First presentation:
http://designinterfaces.blogspot.com/2010/02/gis-geographic-information-systems.html

Re-Modeling the Eden Project using SketchUp 7 and Rhino Grasshopper, Ernest Shtepani_Mattr.nr. 4049921

The Eden Project is a visitor attraction in the United Kingdom, including the world's largest greenhouse. Inside the artificial biomes are plants that are collected from all around the world. The project is located in a reclaimed Kaolinite pit, located 2 kilometers (1.25 mi) from the town of St Blazey and 5 kilometers (3 mi) from the larger town of St Austell, Cornwall
The complex comprises a number of domes that house plant species from around the world, each dome emulating a natural biome. The domes are made out of hundreds of hexagons.

I used firstly SketchUp 7 because that was the program I analyzed during the first part of this semester, so I wanted to experiment with the soap bubble interface, which is an easy way to generate shapes especially domes which have an engineer character.
-Second program I use was Grasshopper since I could by using a specific definition easy generate the hexagons of the same size all over Domes surfaces.

first presentation
http://designinterfaces.blogspot.com/2009/11/sketchup-7.html