Week 9: Document Planning and Drawings

I have become increasingly stressed and overwhelmed this week with my workload which isn’t good for my productivity. Sue gave me some good pointers on things to focus on and start working on. I began with by planning the document for my co-design workshop. Below is the development of these layouts. I adjusted these over the week so they conveyed my ideas in the best way possible with the work I have at this point.

I have also been getting a bit lost in a pool of ideas my project is focused around in my head and I have been feeling like I’ve gone too far off course. I decided to sit down and spend some time writing a project description so that I could regain direction and focus as well as use it for my presentations.
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Positioned in the centre of Fort Lane in downtown Auckland, my interactive public installation design explores conceptual ideas of film space through the consideration and manipulation of human movement and behaviour and acts as a host for a range of creative events. The large installation curtain articulates the performative qualities of fabric through movement and form, influencing movement and experience through the space. Based on the contrasting interpretation of fictional space between behind the scenes work and audience consumption of film on screen, the curtain shifts and changes positions and layouts to create a variety of experiential spaces within the same location. With Fort Lane acting as a service area and shortcut, my project aims to initiate pedestrian destination purpose within the space, slowing down and making movement more considered. The installation will also act as a bridge of connection between the public and Auckland’s creative communities. Inspired by the variety of creative practices involved in the production of film, the installation is the centre of a range of creative expression events over the period of a week.

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I sent this to Sue and after some feedback on how to develop it, I rewrote it to work better.

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Positioned in the centre of Fort Lane in downtown Auckland, The Performance Project, a temporary textile installation will support a festival of creative events. Ideas of cinematic fictional space perception are explored here as a dynamic system of curtains, movement and event. With Fort Lane acting as a service area and shortcut, my project aims to slow down and connect the public to an imaginary urban space created by the fluid movement of textile and the creative events that come to life within it. The suspended textile curtains will shift to transform the space and experience of the installation and create a theatre/performance space. The textile curtains will be further animated by the weather conditions of the site and produce a range of atmospheric states to enhance the dramatic scenes taking place. Based on the contrasting interpretation of fictional space between behind the scenes work and audience consumption of film on screen, the curtain shifts and changes positions and layouts to create a variety of experiential spaces within the same location.

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This week I also began work on some drawings for my co-design workshop next week as a lot of my work so far has been idea development and explorations and reviewing. I began with trying to use my basic digital model of my curtains in blender to create fabric form and movement but I really struggled with creating the effect well.

I then decided that I would be able to create a better effect with hand drawings of the curtains because I felt like I had more control over the method. I used my Rhino model of Fort Lane and the curtain installation to set up a perspective view and used that to frame and draw the curtain from the right angle. I used these images to draw the curtains for each view.

I did the same for the section views and used illustrator to trace the plans of the curtain layouts.

While working on the plan view of the theater space, I noticed that my original layout for the curtains restricted the space inside the theater. Fort Lane is a narrow space as it is and by adding walkways around the theater, space becomes limited inside the installation. This is why I needed to redesign it slightly to make the most of the space and work with more particular dimensions.