Facade automations generate a pattern across a whole building in seconds.
◦ What does the automation know, and what does it not know?
The automation knows the number of windows and the window/facade ratio to ensure that you have the exact percentage of natural light that you want. Additionally, it knows how to switch between different patterns of windows.
◦ Where did the generated pattern need overriding, and why?
The generated pattern did not know where the rooms were placed, so many of the windows existed in weird spots (e.g. halfway in someone’s room, in a visible bathroom, etc.) and because of this the generated pattern needed to be changed to ensure that the windows made sense with the rest of the building. Because the facade and the building don’t really talk, the operator needs to serve as the communication and override the pattern when it does not make sense.
◦ If the automation produces something that analyses well but looks wrong, which wins?
I believe that the perspective matters more than the analyses. Because the automation will never experience what windows and light are like (a.k.a will never live to experience the building), it cannot be sure that its choices are the best fit for human consumption. While the analysis might provide the best solution as an optimization, it does not provide the best solution for the building it is a part of.
What drives a project team's decision about floor to floor height?
◦ From a developer's perspective?
◦ From a designer's perspective?
◦ From an engineer's perspective?
◦ From a builder's perspective?
Last week we chose a massing option based on site evidence. This week you had to fit a program inside it.
◦ Where did the program and the massing disagree, and which one gave way?
Initially, I made the mistake of creating a very large, square massing because I thought it would be the best way to optimize space management. And while this was true, when it came time to create a layout for the floors, I found that the floors were too big and that there was too much wasted space in the middle of the floor where no rooms could go. Because of this, I had to redesign the space and create a smaller area to make better use of the perimeter to area ratio.
◦ What would have had to be true for you to change the massing instead of the program?
I did do this, so instead I will answer the opposite question. Normally, you can change the program to fit the massing as the spacing and sizing of rooms does not necessarily matter as long as some basic requirements are met. For example, each room can change where it is in the grand scheme of the layout, and the shapes can be altered to make everything more or less efficient (if that was a goal, like to increase scarcity of house(?)).
◦ Which of this week's program decisions will the structural engineer and the mechanical engineer assume you got right?
The percentages of rooms, the balcony numbers, the window ratios, the light analysis, and what facade to pick.
Total carbon can now be estimated before materials are specified.
◦ How much confidence should a team place in that number at this stage?
◦ Which decision made this week has the largest effect on it?
◦ How would you present it to a client without overstating its precision?
At some point a conceptual model has to stop being conceptual.
◦ How do you know when a proposal is resolved enough to move into Revit?
I believe that a proposal can be moved into Revit once the purposes of the rooms have been identified. As soon as every space is made clear what it’s goal is, Revit does a great job of providing many customizations and precision tools to turn the proposal into a real schematic. We no longer need to run analyses on the project as most of the outside has been decided, and thus the only need is for structural and interior design choices (as well as other technical components). These cannot be ran on Forma, so now is a good time to make the switch.
◦ What is the cost of moving too early? Of moving too late?
The cost of moving too early is that there might be some missed analysis and information that could prove vital when the project is actually being built. If the building takes in too much light and becomes too hot, then there needs to be adjustments made after construction which could have easily been avoided by running the analysis before hand.
While in this class there is not really a cost of moving too late, In real life the cost of time and money become very real when management is a crucial part of the process. Spending too much time in Forma might mean you are doing processes that should not be done on Forma, or are at least easier to do on Revit. Additionally, waiting to move increases the labor costs as time is spent wasted on certain aspects when it would be okay to move on and continue to the next process.
◦ Which parts of your Forma model do you expect to survive the handoff?
I expect the physical elements to survive the hand off (the room layout, the facade) but not the outside environment and analysis tests that we have been running so far.