challenges:

Levee wall as an end and barrier

City street as a barrier and source of noise

Railroad as a barrier and source of noise

opportunities:

River and city view can be appreciated from a certain height

neighborhood view

Topography is dramatic enough to be played with

The final version photosynth – Press St and Chartres St

Date: 2005-2007

Material: Composite urethane elastomers, silicone elastomers, microprocessors

Designer: Omar Khan is an architect and educator whose work spans the disciplines of architecture, installation / performance art and digital media. His research and interests deal with responsiveness and performativity in architecture. He is principal of Liminal Projects, a practice that has developed performance spaces, interactive and responsive installations, domestic interiors and award winning competitions.

Concept: Small scale model of a responsive architectural system. Columns slowly move down into inhabited space reacting to C02 produced by groups of people causing them to disperse. As CO2 reduces, columns slowly lift enabling people to once again gather – resulting in a dynamic and responsive space.

a. Gas & Liquid Flow:

The movement of gas or liquid.

Viscosity the state of being thick, sticky, and semifluid in consistency, due to internal friction.

Density the degree of compactness of a substance.

measurement devices:

flow sensor is a device for sensing the rate of fluid flow.

anemometer is an instrument for measuring the speed of the wind, or of any current of gas.

viscometer is an instrument for measuring the viscosity of liquids.

hydrometer is an instrument for measuring the density of liquids.

b. Thermal

adjective: of or relating to heat;

noun: an upward current of warm air, used by gliders, balloons, and birds to gain height.

measurement devices:

thermometers is an instrument for measuring and indicating temperature.

thermocouple is a thermoelectric device for measuring temperature.

calorimeter is an apparatus for measuring the amount of heat involved in a chemical reaction or other process.

heat flux, sometimes also referred to as heat flux density or heat flow rate intensity is a flow of energy per unit of area per unit of time.

thermistor is an electrical resistor whose resistance is greatly reduced by heating, used for measurement and control.

thermostat is a device that automatically regulates temperature, or that activates a device when the temperature reaches a certain point.

2. Process

Processing is an open source “programming language and integrated development environment (IDE) built for the electronic arts and visual design communities” with the purpose of teaching the basics of computer programming in a visual context, and to serve as the foundation for electronic sketchbooks.

Processing includes a “sketchbook”, a minimal alternative to an IDE for organizing projects.

Every Processing sketch is actually a subclass of the PApplet Java-class which implements most of the Processing Language’s features.

When programming in Processing all additional classes defined will be treated as inner classes when the code is translated into pure Java before compiling. This means that the use of static variables and methods in classes is prohibited unless you explicitly tell Processing that you want to code in pure Java mode.

3. Transform/output

chemical reaction

A chemical reaction is a process that leads to the transformation of one set of chemical substances to another.

Chemical reactions can be either spontaneous, requiring no input of energy, or non-spontaneous, often coming about only after the input of some type of energy, viz. heat, light or electricity. Classically, chemical reactions encompass changes that strictly involve the motion of electrons in the forming and breaking of chemical bonds, although the general concept of a chemical reaction, in particular the notion of a chemical equation, is applicable to transformations of elementary particles, as well as nuclear reactions.

Reactions and Energy

Chemical energy is part of all chemical reactions. Energy is needed to break chemical bonds in the starting substances. As new bonds form in the final substances, energy is released. By comparing the chemical energy of the original substances with the chemical energy of the final substances, you can decide if energy is released or absorbed in the overall reaction.

Exothermic Reactions

A chemical reaction in which energy is released is called an exothermic reaction. Exo means “go out” or “exit.” Thermic means “heat” or “energy.” Exothermic reactions can give off energy in several forms. If heat is released in an exothermic reaction, the nearby matter will become warmer. The nearby matter absorbs the heat released by the reaction. The reaction between gasoline and oxygen in a car’s engine is an exothermic reaction.

4. Materials

a. Steel Tongue

Steel Tongue chair is inspired by the pierced tongue. The Project Import Export design is handcrafted with stainless-steel wire and recyclable aluminum strips. Adapting cradle-to-cradle concepts, Steel Tongue’s aluminum strips are easily disassembled and reusable on another chair with another shape. This process requires a minimal amount of energy and resource consumption.

Related: Project Import Export

b. Lighttex

When used as a window and skylight covering, the polyester-based Lighttex panel blocks and redistributes direct sunlight more effectively than vertical or horizontal blinds and creates diffused interior daylight with improved uniformity.

Lighttex walls and space partitions enable daylight penetration while providing a view for occupants in an interior space. At an angle, the wall appears opaque, creating a sense of privacy, and yet when viewing the material directly it becomes transparent, creating a sense of openness and a view outside.

Lighttex is an integration of architecture and space, enabling architects to design flat and curved ceilings that appear as a luminous floating element in the space while providing soft light distribution. Various dramatic lighting effects can be achieved depending on the placement and type of light fixtures, creating a broad palette of solutions with simple variables.

c. Pixel Panels

Pixel Panels are one manifestation of the broader family of products called Translucent Concrete and Transparent Concrete, all of which seek to make concrete a light-transmissive medium. Pixel Panels use concrete as a binder within which a uniform array of polymers is added to provide translucency at a given viewing distance. The ratio of concrete to polymer may be varied to allow for limitless variations (ratios as high as twenty-five percent polymer have been achieved).

The Industrial Canal is a 5.5 mile (9 km) waterway in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. The waterway’s proper name, as used by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and on NOAA nautical charts, is Inner Harbor Navigation Canal (IHNC). The more common “Industrial Canal” name is used locally, both by commercial mariners and by landside residents.

The canal connects the Mississippi River to Lake Pontchartrain. It separates New Orleans East from the rest of the city of New Orleans, and the Lower 9th Ward from the Upper 9th Ward. Approximately half of the waterway’s course, from Industrial Lock to a point north of the Florida Avenue Bridge, is confluent with both the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway and the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO).

The entirety of the canal passes through the 9th Ward of the city. Along the riverfront, the canal constitutes the boundary of the Upper 9th Ward’s Bywater neighborhood on the upriver side of the canal and the Lower 9th Ward neighborhood on the downriver side. Near the lake, it is generally considered to be the eastern boundary of the Gentilly neighborhood and the western boundary of New Orleans East.

Since Hurricane Katrina in 2005, proposals have been made to close the northern end of the canal by building a dam at the entrance to Lake Pontchartrain, as part of an effort to block storm surge. A subcommittee of the Bring New Orleans Back Commission has endorsed such a move.

–From Wikipedia. org

2. Concept of my systematic model

Water is the carrier of New Orleans’ Industrial, commerce and immigration. As the historical maps I collected, it is evident that the culture of the city was unwrapped from the water front line. Therefore, at this stage I would like put my focus point on the water body which is regarded as the economic corridor.

My model is supposed to spread from the river and the Industrial Canal. There are four layers in which I would build the model: water body-carrier (cluster of cardboard), port-industrial nodes-input (nails), railroads-pipe-transport (medal cord), and infrastructure-terminal (unknown). When all the layers are constructed together, it is the story of how the city was grew up by the input and output of the industry.