Build infrastructure

Prototype for infrastructure
The infrastructure of house is to provide the basic support such as the structure, the circulation system (stair, lift), supply system (water, electricity pipe), some visible and invisible supply system and so on. According to the book “how building learning”, flow and time and after-occupy are changing the building and infrastructure of building will be changed as well.

The altering body walking through corridor is changing movement because it is affected by the time frame and the objects occupied the space. Corridor supports and links spaces. Using the reference of altering body builds the structural prototype of dynamic objects. This prototype is hopefully to create a model to reflect the time and environmental changing element by the dynamic transforming process. A case study based on a similar concept, which is Sendai Media Centre, built by Toyo Ito, conducts the concept of transforming the swaying seaweed to the structure system.

So, I use my house which is one of the row house in London to test the initial prototype on circulation system. However, the house is quite simple in comparison to hospitals or museums which have more complicated and dynamic forms. I will choose a specific site for setting up infrastructure, and keep developing the prototype as my next step of this project.

Also, there are still other issues. The infrastructure can reflect the outside environment on the model like the discussion in the workshop at Plymouth which used some way to show the data of building in the ‘structure’.

Frame work and skin

The First Draft of Report

Introduction
Human body has been used as the basic architectural elements to create space. In the past, Da Vinci and Le Corbusier presented the relationship between the static body and space on proportion scales. ‘Users will mark the architecture with their actions during occupation, leaving traces that suggest how it should be inhabited.’1 Le Corbusier explained Le Modulo as ’a man who upraises his arm presents the space which he occupied’. The development of the model was based on the proportion of human body as the basic calibration for design. 2
However, the shape of body can change and alter because of the effects of factors in the surroundings. The traces of body also reflect how body relates to the environment and create a new space with body movement.3 Furthermore, the altering body creates a continuous rhythm and dynamic motion as it agitates or disturbs the elements in the space and reforms the dynamic motion.
The aim of this project is to interpret the relations between the body motion and the space by represent the idea of ‘agile’ within the environment. The first part of this project focuses on recording, analysing and creating the boundary of a field where the observed body exists. Body motions are recorded to find out the relationship between body and environment and the field of body. Moreover, the experiment also explains how a body generates turbulence in the air of a field and agitates the pollutants that have settled on surfaces.
It is undoubtedly that body motion reflects the environment and altering body defines a new space. Greg Lynn, author of Animate Form, who was inspired by E.Muybridge and E.J Marey, discussed the methods of capturing and analysing the fluid status of body motions to create new spatial forms. The body motion system would help to construct the tactic and frame of architecture. Therefore, the altering body not only creates the new space in the environment but also is one of the tools to calibrate the four dimensional space of body. The analysis and calibration progress will create a new body space. Moreover, it uses prosthetics to adjust the body movement.
The outcome would be expected to construct a new spatial type and to build a prosthetics which are the extended devices form the observed body in order to adjust the relationship of body and environment and be a tool of reforming body space.

Theoretical and aesthetic methodology
Idea of capturing fluid space
In pursuit of discovering the space from a dynamic movement and developing a scheme in a three dimensional space, the techniques for capturing the fluid status of body motion and scanning the environmental factors are fundamental.
Several methods are applied to record the dynamic fluid movement, which flows with the space over time. These methods are essential to obtain the data of body motions. The recorded data of the physical space are transformed into a method of creating/designing space.2
Moreover, from the research of Muybridge, the dynamic body is in the fluid states with the changing time. With the upgrading of technology, the changes of body can be recorded precisely. It can assist with the recording and analysis of body motions. Furthermore, the observer draws the field of body by the recorded of motion, like the scanning of the body.
Also, the theory, Herztian space3, explains how body motions and environmental pollutions form an invisible space in physical space. Body motion is like ‘the Hertzian space’ which can leave the form and traces as a new surface during every motion.
Moreover, one of the methods was inspired from the picture, in which a dancer leaves her motion traces and creates a new spatial dialogue with the original field. Another method was learned from the idea of motion capture by studying Muybridge and Marey’s photographic and the ‘Instructable’ website.4

The methodology – Light trace + 3D scanner
Light trace
Marey’s photographic work showed the record of dynamic figures by using the tiny reflecting optical disks with rhythms and motion.5 The methods were meant to pursuit the technique for capturing the ever-changing body. My ambition is to use the skill of motion capturing and photographic to develop and draw the animation of a four dimensional space. The body would be able to draw a new surface in the present space and the trace could construct the basic calibrate to measure the space.
If the ‘Hertzian Space’ is transformed to be visible by using scanner, it would help us to record the boundary of dynamic field of body. The methodology is inspired from using the idea of scanning ‘Hertzian space’ 1 to record body field to environment and spatial issue. (Figure xx light test) Therefore, light bulbs, as the electromagnetic radiation, are used to leave the trace of altering body motion. Light bulbs are the medium to be scanned in order to record the boundary of body motion. Photography is used as a scanner to record the changing body and to scan the electromagnetic radiation from the body.
To explain in detail, light bulbs are set on every main joints of the body. The purpose is to eliminate the body profile in the picture and only record the movement of joints in order to read the relationship of altering body and the environment. (Figure xx body light bulb)The experiments show that the light bulbs also draw out the motion in the space. Furthermore, the speed of motion represents the ‘time’ in the space. The exposure time of each frame is set at the same length. The different motions show the different speeds of ‘agile’ in the environment.
3D scanner
Mist, one of the environmental pollutants, is released from body and has settled in the existing space. Human body generates and disturbs this particle in the environment. Body releases pollutants through breath, body heat and vibrates the particle on the body. The altering body could generate mist and form the body-landscape. For example, the Blur (Diller+Scofidio, 2002) 2 releases the mist and reforms the original space and blurs the original boundary of building.
On the other hand, the 3D scanning method scans and records the environmental factors (pollutions and dust). The movement of body can disturbs the mist in the environment. The mist not only leaves the moisture in the space but also releases the smoke to reform the object. The experimental object would be placed on the body which releases mist (smoke) to form a space as the results are being recorded. The 3D scanner also scans the shifting motion figure with the ‘time’ element and is expected to read pollutants surrounded the body in the space. The study supports the understanding of how the altering body and drifting pollutions creates space. Next step is to attach an object which generates the pollutant (mist) on the altering body and record the misty landscape which releases from body with 3D scanner.
Generate Geometry
Although Marey was certainly not interested in higher spatial dimensions, Duchamp engaged with the four dimensional presenting which time and motion are played by. As Duchamp generated higher dimensional form by tracing body motions that were left in space in ‘Nude Descending’, it measured time in a static image of movement.1 Inspired from the idea of Theo Jansen’s shifting work, a four dimensional geometry based on the traces of body will be constructed. It would be a prototype of frame to generate space and a new prosthetics for the body in 3D space. It would also be built in 3D software.
Project tactics
As the ‘Automarionette’ used body to reflect and develop the system of architecture, the strategy of this project is to attach light bulbs on the body in order to record the motion, and track the body field.1 It would calibrate the basic layout of four dimensional body spaces and then create the dynamic geometry by analysing and transforming. The trace of body acts as a ruler of Duchamp to measure the time-based space. It would be a prototype of prosthetics and a frame of spatial geometry of body. The prosthetics are a machine to adjust the curve which is traced by the light bulbs of body as an ideal shape of movement.2

Initial body study work
Agile environment and Prosthetics
The studies of term one focuses on the research of agile ‘environment’ and ‘body’. In order to represent the 'boundary', 'speed', and 'agile' of the environments, the density of lines and the distribution of action symbolise 'the different level of terrain' in three environments (swamp, forest and cliff) which are seen as a continuous landscape. (Figure1) In addition, the bending lines which are continuous and dynamic show the 'agile' movement of body in the environment. The project applies photography which collects and analyses data from the human actions to figure out the relations of the body and the environment because of the inspiration of Eadweard Muybridge and E.J. Marey.4 (Figure2) The series of study in body motion can help to comprehend how body alters in these environments and construct the basic time frame on drawing.
In addition, legs are the key points of human body’s motion and knees are the ‘hinge’ of legs. An additional object is defined as the extra prosthesis that is attached to human body and it is the most important basis to interpret the boundary of body and how it alters in different environments. In the swamp, it resists the buoyancy of water and transforms with amphibious from swamp to the forest. In the forest, it swings between trees and shuttles through to the next tree. On the cliff, it finds out the location where it can anchor and climb to the top to resist the gravity by the depth of the anchor point. By the interpretation of the attached object, the places where the body passes by emerge new relations to space and new surface. (FigureX)
Also, the object records the traces of the shifting body to nomad within three environments. It might be like a sewing machine on the body to weave the surface of body in the environments.1 The trails of nomadic move reflect the environmental status and the object reflects the status of fluid body to adapt space. Therefore, the object of the body is used to travel in different environments and record the regional data where the object passes. The datum of motion provides the basic information for the next move in a new field.

Sites with environmental illness
The project sets up for three body sites, patient / horse rider / model that have sensitive for the environments which are hospital / wild field / catwalk corridor. The choices are applied in the purpose of producing the unseen interface in present environments. The sites are chosen based on the body training system to adapt their movement to environment. Also, technology is used to support and record the motion, and reform the space. However, I will focus on the one site to find out the system of project.
Patient (in corridor) - the patients with environmental illness
Breakspear Hospital: Produce a foggy corridor for environmental illness patients to rehabilitate. The transforming of humidity can help doctors to understand the degree of recovery of patients. There are some different rehabilitation courses for different patients’ symptoms.
a. Basic training of original skeleton- the patient cannot squat
b. Training legs as grasshopper – the patient cannot jump continuously
c. Extending body as the Chimera – the patient’s feet and hands cannot coordinate to climb

The first scenario is constructed at a hospital corridor. The corridor is a passage connecting each room. At Breakspear hospital, electronic physical therapy is used to cure the environmental illness patient. Scanning how patients walk through the corridor is similar to the procedure of curing, in which human body is affected by the events in the corridor and creates new fields. Bodies show different agitating states in the corridor. Different agitating bodies moves along the corridor again and again. The space eventually becomes more agile from the trace of light. As the drawings, Skelton / Grasshopper / Chimera, are generating the initial geometry in order to develop in 3D space.

Project Further work
Another strategy is to choose one site and focus on the bodies that go through the corridor in the hospital (maybe it could be in a different environment). Discussion will stress the character of corridor in the building. For example, the corridor which is between two patients’ rooms shows different spatial characters with the corridor which is between the doctor room and the operation room. Therefore, the different events would affect the motion of body and construct the different geometry because of different character corridor. This is aim to create new infrastructure in the space. Possibly, the system will be able to be applied to another environment for constructing the new relationship of body and the corridor and the relationship of corridor and ‘the building’.