Marc Aurel Schnabel

Web 2.0 virtual design studio: social networking as facilitator of design education

In 2009, Deakin University and the Chinese University of Hong Kong trailed the use of Web 2.0 technologies to enhance learning outcomes in a third-year architectural design studio that was modelled on the virtual design studios (VDSs) of the past decades. The studio developed the VDS further by integrating a social learning environment into the blended learning experience. The Web 2.0 VDS utilized the social networking site Ning.com, YouTube, Skype and various three-dimensional modelling, video and image processing, and chat software to deliver lectures, communicate learning goals, disseminate learning resources, submitting, providing feedback and comments to various design works, and assessing of students’ outcomes. This research centres on issues of learning and teaching associated with the development of a social network VDS.

Spatial Understanding in Immersive Virtual Environments

In this study, we examined the perception and understanding of spatial volumes within immersive and non-immersive virtual environments by comparison with representation using conventional media. We examined the relative effectiveness of these conditions in enabling the translation to a tangible representation, through a series of design experiments. Students experienced, assessed, and analysed spatial relationships of volumes and spaces and subsequently constructed real models of these spaces. The goal of our study is to identify how designers perceive space in Virtual Environments (VEs). We explore issues of quality, accuracy and understanding of reconstructing architectural space and forms. By comparison of the same spatial performance task undertaken within a Head Mounted Display, screen-based and real 2D environment, we are able to draw some conclusions about spatial understanding in immersive VE activity.

Mixed Reality In Architecture, Design, And Construction

Mixed Reality is moving out of the research-labs into our daily lives. It plays an increasing role in architecture, design and construction. The combination of digital content with reality creates an exciting synergy that sets out to enhance engagement within architectural design and construction. State-of-the-art research projects on theories and applications within Mixed Reality are presented by leading researchers covering topics in architecture, design collaboration, construction and education. They discuss current projects and offer insight into the next wave of Mixed Reality possibilities.

The Changing Face of Problem-Based Learning: Social Networking and Interprofessional Collaboration

Social networking and interprofessional collaboration is changing the face of problem-based learning (PBL). An interprofessional PBL programme addressing the problem of limited community awareness of preventive caries management was undertaken by University of Sydney dentistry students consulting on design issues with Chinese University of Hong Kong architecture students. The PBL programme employed social networking as a platform of engagement between peers and facilitators in the two countries developing solutions to the problem of communication of the oral health message to varied community groups. All groups developed effective design solutions but the superior results of the dentistry-only PBL groups stressed the need for scaffolding modification to enhance synchronous online engagement. In developing collective intelligence social networking offers the opportunity to extend use of PBL beyond geographic and professional boundaries provided synchronous augmented communication is possible.

Framing Mixed Realities

New ‘realities’ are emerging. Novel concepts such as Mixed Reality, Augmented Reality and Augmented Virtuality and their supporting technologies influence architecture, design and construction. These realities replace or merge with the normal physical world and they can be tailored to enhance comprehension for specific design and construction activities. The various realms, their research and applications and their relevance to the field are presented and critically reflected upon. Finally the Reality-Virtuality Continuum is analysed regarding its engagement, abstraction and information overlay.

3D Crossover: Exploring Objets Digitalisé

By merging a range of digital and physical media, the architectural design process is enriched by different perceptions, comprehensions and conceptions of spatial volumes within both physical and virtual environments. The use of digital media often confines the design process to only the digital realm; in this class, students moved fluidly back and forth from digital to physical using digital tools in unorthodox ways. These different media transformed the design process from a tangible portrayal of architectural design to a virtual portrayal, and vice versa. With this interchanging and crossing over of design environments from reality to virtuality the limits of each one are dismantled, both realms can be brought together in an overall process that led to alternative form findings and resulting designs. This work lies in the tradition of artists who push media to explore new interpretations both of the media themselves and of their artwork.

Rethinking Parameters in Urban Design

This paper describes the unique coupling of an architectural urban design studio with an in-depth digital media course for the purpose of exploring new avenues of architectural expression, urban form-finding, and communication through the exploration of urban parameters. By merging descriptive parameters of urban situations with digital parametric tools, the understanding of urban design processes was enhanced by the possibility to perceive and comprehend larger problems of spatial urban experiences. The paper discusses how variables, goals, and outcomes of this urban design studio, as well as its integration with digital parametric design, allowed the participants to create an innovative urban design language. It reviews the implications for design education, as well as for the understanding and communication of complex urban designs that are responsive to a variety of parameters. This work lies in the tradition of artists who push media to explore new interpretations of both the media themselves and of their artwork as much as it does of the use of parametric systems as technological tools.

The Museum of Gamers: Unmediated Cultural Heritage Through Gaming

In the 1990s when Nicholas Negroponte published his infamous comparison between bits and atoms for Wired magazine, it was no longer strange to talk about a new concept for galleries, libraries, archives and museums (GLAMs). Pointing to a new future for libraries, Negroponte was already aware that being digital had its own reality, which was to create ambiguity in relation to the value of physicality or pure materiality, a reality that the world had been accustomed to since the Industrial Age. The Museum of Gamers, as a conceptual proposal we argue for here, sits at the convergence of these contrasting realities. On the one hand, there is a cultural artefact that has a concrete value attached to its authenticity. On the other, its digital interpretation has its own systems of values about being. And the visitor cares about a GLAM’s auxiliary services as much as the objects. As information is now available everywhere, people expect a new normal from museums besides mere objects and explanatory texts next to them. As the emblematic medium of contemporary societies games offer engagement methods. Recent marketing strategies such as loyalty games and gamification prove that use of technology is moving ever closer to video games and game-design methods. The Museum of Gamers is a creation not only for the dissemination of cultural heritage information but also for its production through contemporary media technologies.

Amphiboly of Digital Heritage

Digital Heritage is twofold in nature. There is rigid and actual heritage value as well as the freedom of digitality. Fusing the two adds a new layer to the authenticity issue prevalent in heritage studies. Within the context of our research of Kashgar, we confront three sub-layers to discuss authenticity. They are dichotomies between self-other (identity), topophilia-topophobia (place) and unilateral-plural perceptions (time). Our research interrogates these in relation to the people of Kashgar via digital applications. The approach taken is led by a Research through Design (RtD) approach which focuses on immediate user experiences through game design methods. The game is to produce feedback and data for understanding how creative digital media applications can enforce contestation for a plural and rich outcome instead of unilateral which contemporary digital media applications prevalently fall victim of.

Relationship between Mean Radiant Temperature and Building Type for Pedestrians in Rotterdam

Outdoor thermal comfort for pedestrians becomes important issues in urban planning affecting everyone’s daily lives. Mean Radiant Temperature (T mrt) is one of the most important parameters in micro climate. In this study, we built a computerised model with variable and typical building types. Then a radiation model SOLWEIG was used to simulate pavements’ T mrt spatial variations. We analysed and discussed the simulation results by comparing different building types. We used RayMan to find some relationship between thermal comfort index PET or PMV. Our finding can act as a reference for architects and planners to make design decisions on quantifying the thermal comfort in specific urban environment and their building types.