CONCLUSION

Reflections on Superstudio sessions.

The final post for the March Super studio blog is a summary of my reflections on the important things I have learnt from the sessions that I have taken. Apart from BIM, the two workshops I was involved in were on Plaster and laser cutting. Being new to the university, the exposure to the different types of workshops that the university offered was very beneficial in familiarizing myself with different types of experimental and model making processes that I can utilize for my projects in the university and later in professional practice.

My experience in the plaster workshops made me realize that it is important to understand the materiality of plaster, in relation to the type of model I wanted to make. One of the mistakes that I made with plaster was that, I made a mould that was not suitable to cast a plaster model. When casting a plaster model, it is important to avoid undercuts as much as possible, and try to avoid absorbent materials such as wood for the formwork. Even though wood can still be used with the help of a release agent, it would save time and error if the formwork is made from a non-absorbent material. In addition, it is also important to be careful in making the plaster mix, as the consistency and ratio of the mix has an impact on the final outcome of the cast. In addition to its use in the university, making models using plaster casts assists in communicating certain characteristics of the design ideas to clients in the future.

My first workshop session was on plaster and the session demonstrated various laser cut formwork moulds, and that is when I decided that I would choose to explore laser cutting workshops, to make a mould for my plaster cast. The digital printing sessions introduced me to all the different types of 3d printing machines that they offered, including advantages and disadvantages of each one of them. I found it very useful as this would help me in deciding which type of printing I would work on depending on the material finishes, or the outcome I wanted to achieve in my future projects. Furthermore, using both laser cutting and 3d printing methods in model making is associated with proper time management in both preparation of files and in executing work. This is rather crucial while battling project deadlines in university projects and in real projects in professional practice. 

Lastly, my sessions on learning Revit was very effective as it was the first time using the software, and taught classes combined with Lynda tutorials really enabled me to achieve confidence in using Revit. In the past, I had considered Revit being complicated, as I have been more used to AutoCad. But I found that using Revit is more time saving, and it encouraged me to focus my attention on how different architectural elements worked, rather than drawing lines. These lessons have taken me a step ahead in using Revit to collaboratively work in the professional field. 

To conclude I would like to highlight that the mistakes and lessons I have learned during these sessions has encouraged me to experiment my designs using a variety of model making workshops in my future projects as well as in the professional field.  

BIM WORKSHOP 3

Individual exercises on Lynda tutorials

Exercise on adding text using the Lynda tutorials. 

tx for text

This tutorial helped to demonstrate how to add text without and with leaders, and how I can add multiple leaders to one text. Below are some screenshots of the process. Please note that I have used support files from lynda.com to do the exercises on. 

Figure 1. Adding text

Figure 2. Adding leaders to text

Figure 3. Adding additional leaders to one text

Exercise on Wall families.

1- Basic wall family

This tutorial demonstrated on how to edit a basic wall type to be a plumbing wall. Following are screenshots of the work process.

Figure 1. After selecting the wall to edit, a duplicate is created so that all other walls with the same type that are not selected  is not edited. 

Figure 2. Adding a structure (metal stud) layer 

Figure 3. Adding a thermal air layer in between the two metal stud layers of the wall

Figure 4. Close up shot of the basic wall type edited to be a plumbing wall type.

2- Curtain wall

This session was on a basic tutorial on inserting and editing curtain walls. 

Figure 8. Curtain wall inserted using the wall tool.

Figure 9. Curtain wall viewed on 3d view

Figure 10. Curtain wall stretched using the arrow head

Figure 11. Curtain wall added into a basic wall

Figure 12. Elevation view of the curtain wall which was added into a basic wall

Figure 13. Editing the curtain wall by double clicking into the curtain wall and using the modify tool

Figure 14. Modified curtain wall.

Conclusion

After working on introductory lessons such as creating grids, walls and inserting families, I thought of familiarizing myself with additional basic elements that is required during a project. The tutorial on adding texts and leaders was useful in showing how I can label different elements of the building I am working on. It is a very simple task, but being new to Revit, working on a tutorial like this will make my work faster when I am working on an actual project on Revit. In addition, I worked on two types of wall families, the basic wall and curtain wall. The basic wall demonstrated on how I can edit a wall and change it to a plumbing wall. It was interesting to know how easily I can change the type of a wall, and how it is automated in Revit, instead of working on a similar task in AutoCad.