On December 10-11, 2022, Computational Design: NEXT 12, a 2-day online interactive conference with global frontiers, featured new emerging technologies in art, architecture, design, and manufacturing. The conference was organized under the collaboration of Parametric Architecture (PA) and DesignMorphine (DM), which had many participants worldwide.
You can check the following link to watch the conference: Computational Design: NEXT 12.
The first day of NEXT 12, started with a great lecture by Carlos Bañón, the co-founder of Subarquitectura, associate professor of Architecture and Sustainable Design, and director of AIRLAB at SUTD. In this lecture, he started his presentation with a brief discussion on his recent work ‘expanding architectural discipline boundaries through AM and AI’ and he explained how he has been integrating AI into his research and built projects in Singapore. He explores the potential of AI-generated tools such as Midjourney, he showed his images created by Midjourney, and explained his journey to the audience.
He talked about pavilions such as “iLight Marina Bay” which they built using tools like Grasshopper and Karamba. He talked about the complex bonds they established between the structure and the system during the project process. He did this research with his students at the Singapore University of Technology and Design. After that, Carlos opened the topic of “the Architecture of waste” where he showed some great projects that have been done by reusing construction materials. In the studio, they 3d print furniture, products, and other objects by using waste as a material.
Edward Meyers, the designer at the Computational and Design Research Group at Zaha Hadid Architects (CODE), led a great webinar session using Autodesk Maya. Ed started the session with a presentation about the fantastic projects he has been involved in. He is working on what he can do in the urban area and product scale with different fabrication techniques. After that, he delivered an intuitive and wonderful Maya tutorial covering some basics that would help in creating organic constructible fluid forms.
Jan Contala, the experimental designer and co-founder of the Cera.LAB, a digital craft collective based in Innsbruck, delivered a presentation showcasing some of his works. He talked about the history of clay, ceramics, and other material they used as a collective, and how Cera.LAB is using it in its fabrication processes. Cera.LAB works on different scales such as product design to architectural design. Also, he mentioned cultural diversity and biodiversity connection; how it inspires their design process. In the end, Jan explained some of the techniques and insights on building 3D printers for fabrication.
Rodrigo Etcheto, the founder and CEO of Moonray, a surreal 3rd-person action RPG set in a fantastical sci-fi world, introduced the audience to the amazing process of making Moonray. Rodrigo showed sketches and 3D models, created by Unreal Engine 4, from the early stages of making the game. He explained the character, environmental, architectural, and map design of the game; and also, gave some hints about game design. Additionally, he mentioned Moonray comics and tradeable NFT projects of the game.
Karl-Johan Sørensen, an architect, computational designer, and co-founder at SAGA Space Architects, commenced a fantastic webinar session started with a presentation about his space habitat projects. Karl mentioned that they refer to an area in Greenland as the area most similar to the moon for their work. He mentioned some similar points between these 2 places such as weird light environment, vacuum/harsh cold (forced encapsulation), featureless landscape, isolation, self-reliance, monotony, etc. Then he moved to a Grasshopper tutorial on how to create foldable origami forms.
Nikoletta Karastathi, the practicing architect, tutor, and material designer, delivered a wonderful and colorful lecture about her works in material design. She started the lecture with a presentation about her background and how did she involve with textile materials design and experimentation. Then, Nikoletta showcased some of her works and research processes. She talked about how she uses biological materials in her projects. she showed the audience her experiments on the reactions of the materials.
The second day started with Yimeng Yu, an interdisciplinary fashion designer, and artist giving a fascinating and informative lecture. Yimeng presented some of her works on fashion design and explained how she is integrating her fluid and bold designs with emerging digital tools and Metaverse. She designs systems and forms using digital tools to create more than a design. Also, she mentioned fashion industry chain innovation; virtual clothing customization, blind box clothing remaking system, wearable digital interactive pattern printing device, user data parametrized accessory systems, light travel pockets systems, and mutually-beneficial microbial staining systems are some of them.
She works on biological material use and texture and also, and she gave lectures about this. She showed us, her studio’s chosen works. Currently, she is focusing on textiles, accessories, and fashion at the intersection of digital material, 3d printing, and technology.
Eva Hafeez, a multidisciplinary designer artist, and procedural generator at Wilder World commenced a wonderful and smooth Houdini tutorial. During the session, Eva created a 3d model influenced by the cyberpunk theme in an intuitive and compact workflow.
Mitchell Joachim, the co-founder at Terreform ONE, associate professor of practice, and co-chair of global design at NYU delivered an informative session followed by an interesting discussion about parametric tools and AI. Before Mitchell started a discussion about his work, he started his presentation by expressing his thoughts on the current topic of AI. He talked about his thoughts on how we can use the possibilities that AI opens up to us.
After this short introduction, he continued his presentation by talking about his alternative view of architecture. Mitchell showcased his team’s enormous efforts of research and practice to protect and save the biosystem and environment.
Francis Bitonti, the CEO, and Co-founder of Lexset, delivered an engaging and informative presentation about the applications of AI and computational design in solving engineering problems in different fields. In his works, uses computational techniques to find new solutions to design and engineering problems.
The footwear designer and educator Francisco Bernal gave a 90-minute tutorial on the conference’s second day. Francisco used Gravity Sketch to show his workflow to design footwear. He talked about the details of the modeling process and then showed how technical editing was done in Grasshopper.
Asher Levine, the fashion designer who has produced one-of-a-kind pieces for celebrities such as Lady Gaga, Will.i.am, the Black-Eyed Peas, Taylor Swift, Demi Lovato, Sam Sparro, Beyonce, and Rita Ora. He began his presentation by talking about how he built his creative world. Asher shared his unique designs with the audience and gave insights about the fabrication and materials he has been promoting in his works. He talked about the impact of space on his creative world and continued by talking about how nature, space, and everything are interconnected. He talked about going beyond the body with extensions.
The Founder and Creative Director of PA, Hamid Hassanzadeh, and the Design Director of DesignMorphine, Michael Pryor, announced the Computational Design: NEXT 13 will occur between April 15 – 16, 2023. Registration is open! Click here to register and view recordings of the complete Computational Design: NEXT 12 conference.
Article created by Serra Utkum Ikiz and Muaz Emre.
