Re-Modeling the Eden Project using Sketchup soap bubble plugin and Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010

The Eden Project is a visitor attraction in the United Kingdom, including the world's largest greenhouse. The complex comprises a number of domes. The domes are made out of hundreds of hexagons plus a few pentagons that connect the whole construction. The project was conceived by Tim Smit and designed by architect Nicholas Grimshaw and engineering firm Anthony Hunt and Associates (now part of Sinclair Knight Merz).

Sketchup soap bubble plugin. Used it to create the series of domes, which transfers shapes into tensile surfaces which can be applied to the physics of a dome. Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010.Conceptual massing tool.The tool newly introduced to the 2010 version enables the user to apply a set of different patterns to a specified surface.

http://designinterfaces.blogspot.com/2010/02/autodesk-revit-architecture-2010.html
http://designinterfaces.blogspot.com/2009/11/sketchup-7.html

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 the Zentrales Stellwerk using Sketchup Pro 7 and Grasshopper

Building brief description:
The Zentralles Stellwerk tower is a design of the architects Herzog & Meuron and consist in a sign tower for trains supervision. It is located in Basel, Switzerland and it was finished in the year 1997. The building main form characteristic is the facade of sheets of copper and the twist of the tower.
Programs used:
The modelling of the building will be generated with Sketchup pro 7 because of it simplicity to model and transform 3D regular shapes. This program is a good tool to easy solve 3D problems and allow several export extensions to keep working the model in other applications. In the case of this work, the program is useful because it allow to export as a DWG file, which is compatible with other program used in this work: Rhino 4.
To model the facade it will be use the grasshopper plug-in for Rhino 4 because of the fast and easy way to generate the louvers elements throug the components and the possibilities to live edit them. Grasshopper is a graphic algorithm editor integrated with Rhino 3D modelling.

First presentation:
http://designinterfaces.blogspot.com/2010/01/solidworks.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 and SketchUp 7

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

sketchup 7, Ernest Shtepani_Mattr.nr. 4049921

SketchUp is a 3D modeling program designed for architects,
civil engineers, filmmakers, game developers, and related professions.
First released in August 2000 as a general purpose 3D content creation tool, with the tagline "3D for Everyone" and envisioning a software "that would allow design professionals to draw the way they want by emulating the feel and freedom of working with pen and paper in a simple and elegant interface, that would be fun to use and easy to learn. Google acquired SketchUp on March 14, 2006, attracted by SketchUp work developing a plug-in for Google Earth. Since then in the Goggle Earth itself can be found thousands of 3d models of important buildings all around the world which help getting a better understanding of space in 3dimensions.

SketchUp version 7 the latest version has incorporated new interfaces some of them you will find described in this booklet.