MASTER OF ADVANCED STUDIES IN ARCHITECTURE
Specialization in Computer Aided Architectural
Student Pages
Dominik Zausinger
|dominikzausinger@student.ethz.ch | zad@an-architecture.de|
|Phone: 0041-78-9497018|
module_2 : helvepolis back to main page
voxopolis - scale and complexity
software: processing (http://processing.org/)
abstract: Attach:eCAADe2010-Abstract.pdf
the objective of this module was to build a city generator program built with object oriented programming with processing
urban design, perhaps even more than architecture, is a time-dependent discipline. therefore design thinking necessarily shifts towards a more process-based and analytical methodology as the effort is no longer to understand the static configuration of a masterplan but to tease out the behaviors of a design over time. this emphasizes a non-linear design process that is itself organic, iterative and research based, integrating performance with form.
voxopolis, a three-dimensional expansion of conway’s game of life, is our approach to adress this issue. the city’s evolution is controlled at three scales: the scale of the urban community, the scale of the buildings, and the scale of individual units. each voxel, a three-dimensional equivalent of a pixel, represents a unit within a building and responds dynamically to collective conditions of its 26 neighbors. the behavior and evolving states of these voxels then inform the subsequent generations of buildings which in turn affect the urban development. however, the chain of intelligence is not linear. rather, changes at the larger scale of the urban fabric also influence the conditions for voxel evolution, setting in motion a self-generative environment with complex configurations that could never have been individually predetermined. each subsequent generation of the city is a result of the previous generations as well as the rules implemented at the localized level.
for more detailed informations please read the abstract
voxopolis skyline
a short movie showing the generative process:
a anaglyph 3D animation:
the development of a city based on a voronoi subdivision shows clustering of villages before growing to a city
each plot color shows the distribution of black and white voxels of its building. this row of images shows the results of a rule which leads to a segregation process within the city
the city with buildings displayed
a anaglyph 3D view of the city
the user interface which allows the user to change the rules during the process
