Before my final semester at Washington University in Saint Louis, I decided to teach myself to code. And so I picked up processing. From the moment that I played with a simple surface transformation script, I knew I wanted to code deeply. I was amazed at the power of coding to iterate and produce faster results than any tasks I could accomplish manually.
In my final semester, one of my studio professor insisted that I begin my project through manual hand modeling explorations. I started doing this, but my instinct told to stop trying to do this manually. To his disappointment and disapproval, I barely finished the study model, and had barely anything to show for my efforts. Yet instead, I used my time to prepare scripts for study model generation. Next time we had a studio session, I had ten iterations ready and quickly produced, exceeding the output that my extremely talented non-coding studio mates produced.
There were ten well developed iterations, and my professor did not know how I produced them so fast. This became the trend for the rest of the semester. I had scripts for different purposes: Panel generations; physics simulations; Space frame generation; Panel counting; generation of sections for laser cutting. The final semester project became not about the brute force often associated with architecture design productions of models, drawings, and renderings. Instead it became about working smarter, efficiently, and again unveiling possibilities inherent in coding; incorporating a programming mindset to the production challenges faced in architecture on a daily basis.
For this reason, I endeavor to understand the complexities of design software/ BIM to create smarter workflows in architecture. I see endless possibilities in the implementation of design software to manage data for the output of architecture deliverables. I admire well developed complex and clean construction documents, and cringe when I realize that a bleary-eyed intern or architect had to stay up late to manually draw in thousands of lines, make annotation leaders point to their right location, or god forbid manually change thousands of revision numbers on title blocks.
Currently, I am learning Javascript, Python, and Dynamo. With regards to coding or working towards licensure, I am constantly improving, and aim to more accurately position myself into a computational/ design technologist role.
I found these two articles personally meaningful in trying to demystify what is a “computational designer,” and critically examining their role in the AEC Industry:
Positioning Computational Designer In Your Business – More Things to Consider by KonRad Sobon
Positioning Computational Designers in your Business – 4 Things to Consider by Nathan Miller