RobiNZ CAD Blog

Italdesign @ 33

Automotive.com have a great article celebrating Italdesign’s 33^rd Anniversary. They feature a range of concept and production cars, both exotic and everyday. Italdesign excel at both, as seen in my photo below! 

Italdesign Giugiaro | European Car Magazine Article at Automotive.com
Thirty years marks a generation. For most of us, that's how long it takes just to grow up, tame our wild oats, settle down and start doing something productive. Few of us make much of a mark in so little time. Giorgio Giugiaro and Aldo Mantovani, on the other hand, have made an indelible mark on our automotive generation--first separately, then together as Italdesign, all in the 33 years since the company was born in 1968…

Tags: italdesign

Cool Auto Design, Thanks to Pulse...

While I have many CAD/BIM/Design RSS feeds in my reader it’s always good to find new ones. In this case I found Car Body Design.com via Franco’s “Novedge Pulse” aggregator.

It has some brilliant “behind the scenes” stories on Auto design, including the tiny Fiat Phylla concept, and links to many tutorials/demonstrations for 2D & 3D Design software (including Photoshop, 3DS Max, Maya & Alias).

 Car Body Design.com Tutorials - www.carbodydesign.com

Car Body Design.com - Fiat Phylla Concept

Sony's HD Foam

Sony are at it again! After Balls, Paint and Play-Doh Rabbits it’s Foam!

470 Million Litres of foam, shot in the streets of Miami!

From http://www.sony.co.uk/images via Sony NZ

Why New Zealand needs a new flag!

I’m not picking on Corel but the image (left) is from an email upgrade offer for Corel X4. Since it’s distributed in both Australia and New Zealand by the same company you just have to pick the correct button for each country to place your order in local currency.

Can you tell?

When I was on holiday in Viet Nam we found, in a rather remote place, a cafe (below) which made quite a feature of selling “X Cream” New Zealand ice cream. It was very nice and even came with free broadband access. The thing was, and I didn’t notice when I took the photo, the shop sign featured an Australian Flag!

Did they know? If a Kiwi didn’t why should they?

  

That’s why we need this:

NZ Flag.com Website - www.nzflag.com
This site is intended to stimulate debate about the New Zealand Flag. We want all New Zealanders to ask whether the current flag represents our country as we see ourselves today? Can we improve it?
Does it portray the image we want to give of New Zealand internationally?
Most importantly, does it inspire us?

Stunning street animation

This is off-topic but I couldn't resist sharing it. Blu's streetscape based animation is amazing.


via DRAWN!

Doodling for thinking

Hugh MacLeod’s Microsoft Blue Monster is featured in a Businessweek article on “doodling” as a tool for business. There is more to business than Word and PowerPoint!

gapingvoid: "cartoons drawn on the back of business cards": "doodling for profits"

There's a great little article on the Businessweek website about the power of doodling in the corporate world.

Amazing Paper Airplanes

This recent post on A Welsh View appealed thanks to my Paper Airplane obsession…

A Welsh View: Japanese Scientists, Origami Masters Hope to Launch Paper Airplane From Space
Shinji Suzuki, a professor at Tokyo University's Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, believes that a successful flight from space by an origami plane could have far-reaching implications for the design of re-entry vehicles or space probes for upper atmospheric exploration….

And thanks to John, a reader, for the link to this site with amazing paper projects;

Yees Job - www.yeesjob.com
Yee is a Canadian Artist. His company Yee's Job is located in Montreal. He designs & handcrafts all kind of paper craft.

And here’s another:

Paper Aircraftwerks - www.paperaircraftwerks.com
Detailed paper Models from a PDF

2001: A Computer Graphics Discovery, and farewell Arthur

Farewell Arthur:

I had this in draft form ready to post on 6 April. That would have marked the 40th anniversary of the release of the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. However after today’s news it seems appropriate to post it now.

Writer Arthur C Clarke dies at 90
British science fiction writer Sir Arthur C Clarke has died in Sri Lanka at the age of 90. The Somerset-born author came to fame in 1968 when short story The Sentinel was made into the film 2001: A Space Odyssey by director Stanley Kubrick.
Sir Arthur's vision of future space travel and computing captured the popular imagination… cont

Sir Arthur C Clarke: 90th Birthday Reflections:

So, on with the original post….

KiyoshiHiHiHi has posted an awesome CG exploration of the spaceship “Discovery” from the best science fiction movie ever made:

2001: A Space Odyssey.

I’ve been fascinated by this movie since I first saw it as a child, about age 6 or 7. That it’s aged so gracefully is a tribute to the effort that went into making it’s technology as “real” as possible, given what they knew at the time, and highest production standards of the day. Especially when you consider it was released in 1968, when we hadn’t landed on the moon, and 2001 was still thirty three years in the future (I was two!). Even today it presents a plausible vision of the reality of long distance space travel.

Piers Bizony’s book 2001: Filming the Future is an awesome illustrated record of the production process from script development, design and filming, through to release. Sadly the “look inside” on Amazon doesn’t show any of the detailed design illustrations used for the craft, costumes and sets seen in the book. It’s worth buying for them alone but the story of it’s creation is also fascinating. Clarke & Kubrick seem to drive each other to new levels of excellence honing the novel/script and making the move.

Piers credits Harry Lange, Frederick Ordway and Tony Masters for production design. Lange & Ordway had worked with NASA and there was lots of input from other Aerospace, Aviation and Computer companies, many involved in the real space programme. He says IBM were heavily involved but chose not to be named after “HAL [the mission computer] was portrayed hijacking the ship then “disconnecting” the human end users”. All the “computer graphic instrumentation” seen in the movie was actually filmed cell animations projected into screens of the space ship sets/models. Apparently there are still a few IBM logos visible in the final movie although the often quoted “HAL is one letter off IBM” was denied by both Arthur & Stanley.

This CG exploration shows Discovery’s internal layout complete with centrifuge crew quarters. That set was built as a 40 Ft diameter “hamster wheel” so the astronauts could appear to walk on the roof in artificial gravity. You can also see the flight deck and the pod bays which led to the infamous line: “Open the pod bay doors, HAL".

We’ve come a long way since 2001 was made but it’s sad that much of that future, is still in the future. I have read the recent release 2001 - A Space Odyssey [on Blu-ray] shows the 70mm negative film in all it’s glory. I’m sure Stanley and Arthur would be pleased.

Via www.flightglobal.com/blogs/hyperbola/

The Story of the a Ribbon

It’s the year of the Ribbon, but why?

Jensen Harris, of the Microsoft Office User Experience Team, has posted a recording (and PowerPoint) of his awesome presentation at MIX. He tells the story of the Office UI development from version 1.0 to 2007. It’s a compelling explanation of why Microsoft ditched Menus & Toolbars for the task based “Fluent interface” with it’s Ribbon, Contextual Tabs, the Mini Toolbar, and Galleries.

Given the impact of this change I recommend it to anyone deploying, training or even just using Office 2007 (or other Fluent based applications). Dealing with, or selling, change is much easier when you can answer the inevitable “Why?” questions with facts rather than speculation!

Jensen Harris: An Office User Interface Blog : The Story of the Ribbon
Last week, I presented a session at MIX called "The Story of the Ribbon." I talked a bit about the general design process we used to come up with the Office 2007 user interface, to iterate on it, and to evaluate it. As part of the discussion, I showed for the first time some of the early prototypes we worked on (and abandoned or refined) along the way…

(Jensen Harris has links for live & download video + the PowerPoint used for the presentation).

Living with the Office Ribbon:

I use Office 2007 at home and found the Fluent UI a dramatic change, for the better. “Ribbon Shock” has worn off and I prefer it to toolbars, especially combined with the Galleries and live formatting preview (seen in Jensen’s video).Unfortunately, I’m able to do a direct comparison every day as still use Office 2003 at work. Once you get past the “where is it” stage I find the ribbon generally supports a more logical work-flow. There is one “feature” of toolbars I’ll never miss. I usually have 2 rows of toolbars in 2003 except when the applications spontaneously start up like this

With the Ribbon, with no toolbars, at least there is no random toolbar scramble.

Other Ribbon related posts:

• MindManager Pro 7 Ribbon vs Toolbars.
• The best Office 2007 Fluent User Interface isn’t from Microsoft!
• Life with MindManager 7 – MindManager veterans will experience “Ribbon shock”.
• AutoCAD 2009 – It’s the User Interface…

Tags: Fluent+UI, Jensen+Harris

Fiat embrace the new media - Geneva 2008

Fiat have gone a bit web 2.0 crazy for the Geneva motor show including a Blog, Flickr & YouTube. Among the car shots, and motor show eye candy, you can see the design model and cad drawings for their “Giant 500 Stand”. It wasn’t me who left a comment about this being the US version of the little 500, but I did think it

Fiat Ginevra 2008 Blog - www.ginevra2008.fiat.it
Fiat on   – including cad images of their “Giant 500” Stand – www.flickr.com/photos/fiat/
Fiat on  – http://www.youtube.com/ginevra2008

     

Tags: Fiat, Fiat+500, Geneva

Fiat 500 Abarth - Re-inventing a design classic

Fiat does small cars best. Abarth has returned to it’s roots, making Fiats fast. The Fiat 500 Abarth is nearly here.

It’s small, it’s Fiat, it’s Abarth and it will be a classic*.

Fiat 500 Abarth Design Preview

Fiat 500 Site - www.fiat500.com

* Unlike the new Mini, a successful failure

Tags: fiat, abarth, Fiat+500

18 Stunning Bridges...

Bridge design can result in some beautiful combinations of engineering and aesthetic excellence. Frikoo have a brilliant review of amazing bridges with photos and information. I’m not really surprised they missed this one…

 

18 Stunning Bridges From Around The World - Frikoo

With the technological boom of the last century came a huge increase in construction capability, and rivers, seas or valleys which were once thought to be completely uncrossable were finally overcome by the advent of numerous new, spectacular bridges. So in honour of these incredible engineering achievements, we have selected our favourite few bridges from around the world. We have the very old, the very new, the very-nearly-finished, the very long and of course the ones which just look very, very cool. Take your pick!

The MacBook Air - Form without function?

It looks lovely, but then you see at all the compromises in spec and wonder…

If Apple are so smart why can’t, or won’t, they design a user replaceable battery?

I’d rather have one of these

UPDATE 2008–01–17: And then you read Sony did it four years ago.

Bertone Saved?

 

RobiNZ Personal Blog: Bertone Sold, Bertone Saved?

William McDonough's "Tower of tomorrow"

Autodesk University AEC Keynote speaker William McDonough was commissioned by Fortune Magazine to design a “Tower of tomorrow” . It’s nice to see his ideas applied to a multi-story city building.

Tower of tomorrow | FORTUNE Magazine

The building of the future will not just sit on a lot – it will breath, sleep, and wake up in the morning. And it will be beautiful…

Imagine a building that makes oxygen, distills water, produces energy, changes with the seasons—and is beautiful. In effect, that building is like a tree, standing in a city that is like a forest.

Via inhabitat.com

Tags: William+McDonough

Sabine Heine - Architectural Illustrator

I really liked these Architectural illustrations found via swissmiss 

swissmiss: Sabine Heine | Illustrator

Play-Doh, coming soon... is here!

• 2.5 tonnes of plasticine on set.
• 40 animators.
• 3 weeks.
• 189 2ft bunnies
• 150 1ft cubes
• 10ft x 20ft purple wave
• 30ft giant rabbit.
• 6 cameras.
• 40 animators working through 4 hours generated 4 seconds of footage.
• 40 animators working on the same scene had never been attempted before.
• The 60 second spot will be constructed of approximately 100,000 stills

In the tradition of Balls and Paint, it’s Play-Doh 

See the preview and wallpapers - Sony BRAVIA - New York - Downloads
(I’ve seen this on YouTube but the “official version” is much better quality)

The result is at http://www.bravia-advert.com/

Disclaimer: I have a Sony ES component Audio system and Trinitron TV, but not a BRAVIA. I just like these adverts!

Tags: Sony+BRAVIA, Play-Doh

Toyota Corolla Art?

The arrival of conceptual shading, and hardware that could cope, in CAD meant escape from the world of wireframe. This Toyota Corolla takes wireframe out of the monitor into the real world…

I can see its ribs! Toyota Corolla in wireframe - Autoblog

Dean Kamen at TED 2007

Seeing Dean Kamen’s presentation, from a Segway but not about them, was a highlight of Autodesk University 2004. This clip gives a glimpse of what he’s about; being remarkable…

Dean Kamen previews an extraordinary new prosthetic arm, on TED.com

 

Inventor Dean Kamen gives a 5-minute talk about the extraordinary prosthetic arm he’s developing at the request of the US Department of Defence, to help the 1,600 "kids" who've come back from Iraq without an arm (and the two dozen who’ve lost both arms). Kamen's commitment to using technology to solve problems, and his respect for the human spirit, have never been more clear than in this deeply moving clip. (Recorded March 2007 in Monterey, California. Duration: 05:41.)

Tags: Dean+Kamen, TED+2007

Cool Architectural font by Lisa Rienermann

 

The Sky fonts by Lisa Rienermann : mirage.studio.7
A font created Lisa Rienermann while studying at the University of Duisburg-Essen, the alphabet is formed of the shapes of buildings against the sky when photographed….

Fiat's "iPod of cars" 500 Powered by Windows

July 4th 2007 was a significant day as, 50 years after the original, Fiat released the new Fiat 500.

Fiat Chief, Sergio Marchionne, was widely quoted "I want Fiat to become the Apple of cars" and “the Cinquecento will be our iPod". Is it IT irony that when you connect an iPod to your new 500, seen right, it’s hooking into a Media & Navigation system that runs on Windows Mobile (note the logo)!

Fiat 500 Microcar Powered by Windows Mobile
The new Fiat 500 was recently revealed and one of the most noticeable features of the tiny hatchback is the Microsoft logo in the cabin..

Software Development : Blue & Me - Fiat and Microsoft Collaboration
Instead of costly and rigid hardware, Fiat Auto and Microsoft is offering a platform that can be adapted to most mobile phones, digital media players and other mobile devices. The customer is free to change them with new models without compromising compatibility with the car.

Fiat wants Cinquecento to be the iPod of cars - Jul. 4, 2007
Fiat hopes its new version of the three-door Cinquecento will become as popular as Apple's device. 

Marchionne was really referring to the new 500 joining the old one, the legendary Bambino, as a design icon. There is no doubting they’ve done a stunning job bringing the classic 500 lines into the 21’st century. It was a challenge when you consider the original was a tightly packaged rear engine car, the new one is front engined & front wheel drive.

I love that in spite of being 5 star safe, front wheel drive, and having 21’st century packaging the 500 is still small. It’s about 100mm shorter than a new Mini, which isn’t very mini. With around 69 – 100bhp from 1.2 or 1.4 Litre engines it should zip around town, certainly more fun than a Prius. If that’s not enough wait till the 500 Abarth (seen testing here) arrives with a rumoured 1.4 Turbo and 140+bhp.

 

There is more on the most important car since the invention of the wheel on my other blog. I can’t wait for the New Zealand launch!

Tags: iPod, Windows+Mobile, Fiat+500

See you at Build NZ 2007?

BuildNZ (inc DesignEX 2007) is the Auckland “industry showcase” for AEC related products & services. It’s a great way to catch up with what’s new from a wide range of exhibitors, including Design Software. I’m planning to go Monday afternoon, see you there maybe?

BuildNZ Website - www.buildnz.com

BuildNZ & DesignEx exhibitors

Tags: BuildNZ

Luigi Colani, the 3D Philosopher…

A long time ago, a product design student got a brief for “A two wheel scooter that is different” and was inspired by a remarkable designer. 20’something years later I still find Luigi Colani’s work both remarkable and inspiring.

Luigi Colani - Translating Nature
One of the most influential designers of the past half-century, Luigi Colani, is the subject of an exhibition at the Design Museum in London...

Tags: Luigi+Colani

Kiwi Photography & Art - Art Attak

Continuing yesterdays theme, another artistic former colleague launches on the web…

Art Attak | Painting | Photography | Gifts
Art Attak began in 2005 as a brand for the creative work of Lesley and Grant Weston. Their work spans everything from oil painting through to photography, often using inspiration from nearby Bethells Beach on the West Coast of the North Island of New Zealand.

Tags: Art+Attak

Words as art - artazon

I recently caught up with a former colleague who I hadn’t seen for a few years. Have a look at her stylish new venture:

funky word art for your home

stylish  -  effective  -  simple

www.artazon.co.nz

Tags: artazon

An introduction to the Green Building Revolution...

KQED QUEST provide a nice short, 11 minute, introduction to the Green Building revolution They cite the new California Academy of Sciences, Golden Gate Park, as new building example and Adobe Systems for retrofit. Green buildings aren’t just about saving the planet, you can save money too!

Ponoko, Ideas made real!

I first heard of Ponoko when their “Blog Editor” Stephen Kempton commented on one of my posts. We exchanged a few emails about Ponoko which makes design concepts real providing a new model for manufacture, sales and distribution. To quote them;

“The Ponoko website is like having your own personal workshop and factory ... and online showroom to sell your designs.”

I had planned a longer post but can “out-source that” by referring you to Franco Folini’s brilliant interview posted at NOVEDGE:

From Bits to Atoms, an Interview with David ten Have, CEO of Ponoko - NOVEDGE blog
David ten Have is co-founder and CEO of Ponoko (blog), a company from New Zealand exploring a new approach to manufacturing. Dave's goal is to provide a customized manufacturing process so easy that almost anybody can use it. Send Ponoko a 3D digital model and they will take care of transforming it into a physical object. They will even help you sell your creation on the market…

I also heard a interview with Ponoko – on Radio Live’s “Public Address Radio” – which is now available as a podcast:

PA Radio: Ponoko.com - If they come, you will build it
Russell Brown interviews David ten Have and Sally Coe of Wellington's ponoko.com, a fascinating start-up that turns ideas into objects…

It's great to see a Kiwi company developing a fascinating concept!

Ponoko – http://www.ponoko.com/

Ponoko Blog – http://www.ponoko.com/blog/

Tags: ponoko

The Secret of Apple Design, sort of..

Technology Review have an interesting article about Apple Design. I don’t have much to do with Apple products, don’t even have an iPod, but it’s interesting to read about their design philosophy & how it impacts the user-­experience, product & manufacturing process.

Technology Review: The Secret of Apple Design
The inside (sort of) story of why Apple's industrial-design machine has been so successful…

Tags: Apple, Technology+Review, industrial+design

New Zealand Edge goes daily

New Zealand Edge have launched a blog to accompany their website and email publications. The New Zealand Edge aims to:

• Introduce metaphors and contemporary frameworks for NZers to articulate who we are (positively hammer some boundary poles of the self into the whenua).
• Articulate and leverage our difference through the edge proposal (landscape, location, attitude, history, Maori, Pacific, character, fringe innovation).
• Increase the prosperity of the country, in spirit and in pocket, by spreading the edge DNA thickly over the culture.
• Build an emotional connection with the global community of New Zealanders.
• Build the de-facto global brand for New Zealand by re-figuring a New Zealand identity based on high achievement in a diversity of disciplines - creative, technological, social and spiritual.

While the site, & now the blog, has a broad range of Kiwi focused content check out this feature “100 New Zealand Design Heroes”. An impressive array of talent from a tiny country.

NEW ZEALAND EDGE: New Zealand Edge goes daily
Greetings nzedge.com friends throughout NZ and in 86 countries.
After eight years of semi-regular publishing, we have moved daily.

Nzedge.com has enjoyed consistent and sometimes exponential growth in visitors and pageviews, and in the first part of 2007 we've experienced an acceleration of sign-ups.

The primary purpose of nzedge.com is storytelling about New Zealand and its role and initiatives in the world. Kevin Roberts and I started the idea of a New Zealand Diaspora (ie that we are a nation of five million people), and we have widely seeded the metaphor of “edge” to define our “reason for being”…

Blog – http://nzedge.blogspot.com/

Feed – http://feeds.feedburner.com/NewZealandEdge

Lucire 22 Cover - Design tuning by blog?

I got to know Jack Yan via his media appearances, his blog, his prolific commenting on my “other blog” and email but we’ve never actually met. One of his many roles is publisher of the Kiwi based global fashion magazine Lucire.

Many publishers research reader opinion after publication but Jack recently went a little bit further by asking his blog readers what they thought before he went to press. Back in February the cover on the left (below) appeared with a question:

“Are there too many cover lines?”

Resulting comments suggested changes and discussed magazine design in general. A few weeks later, in another post, the final version (right) emerged. It revealed fine-tuning as a result of blog comments and further refinement by the Lucire design team. I think the changes were a great improvement.

While I’m not suggesting “design by blog” is an answer for all design problems it’s interesting to see public social media being used this way. It’s common with software, all those public betas & “labs”, but it’s the first time I’ve seen a magazine take this approach. Perhaps it’s better to find out what people think before it’s too late to change!

Lucire 22 cover - Jack Yan on Vox
I hope folks like the new Lucire cover…

One of Jack’s talents is font design – JY&A Fonts – and Lucire is produced with all New Zealand designed fonts:

Scoop: Lucire first consumer magazine with all Kiwi Fonts
“Lucire, the New Zealand-owned international fashion title, says its 20th issue is the first time a consumer print magazine has used domestically designed typefaces exclusively. The magazine features Slabb, designed by Kris Sowersby of Klim, and Lucire and Fiduci, designed by its publisher, Jack Yan.”

“It has always surprised me that our competitors have never been patriotic when it came to magazine design,' says Mr Yan. 'But we produce the best, and some of the most technically demanding, fonts in the world. We always have.”

Tags: lucire, jack+yan

Who pushed Frank Ghery to become an architect?

The answer may surprise you!

Via www.presentationzen.com

Tags: TEDTalks

Creating a concept - The Mercedes-Benz Ocean Drive

Motor Authority have posted a nice video compressing the design, visualisation and manufacture of the Mercedes Ocean Drive Concept car into 90 seconds. It’s interesting to see the mix of digital and traditional techniques. A mix Tablet/Wacom and marker rendering, digital and hand modelling and wonderful craftsmanship. Pity it isn’t beautiful…

 

via autoblog.com

Tags: Mercedes-Benz

Enrico’s Venice

I discovered Enrico’s Blog a year ago and borrowed his idea of using your own photos as a blog header. It probably wasn’t his idea but the header at the time I visited was memorable for someone who likes little Fiats. I thought of it on the flight to AU while watching the movie “Cars” for the first time. Enrico works for Pixar & my favourite character, the yellow cinquecento Luigi “follow only the Ferrari”, reminded me of that image:

I was on the way to The Venetian but Enrico is chronicling travel to the real Venice. If only I had the imagination and talent to create a brilliant travelogue like this…

Enrico’s blog » The Venice Chronicles

Enrico Casarosa is a storyboard artist living in San Francisco, working in Animation by day, publishing artbooks and comics by night. Forever stuck between the gravitational pulls of Italy (his home country) and Japan (a cultural passion).

Tags: Enrico’s+Blog

How will a stadium impact the waterfront? - Architectural Desktop + Google Earth shows

UPDATE 23–11–2006: As per the comments, the images & .kmz model now show the Union building at 47m OAH.

I never thought I’d be modelling a stadium but this shows what a bit of time, Architectural Desktop and Google Earth can achieve.

There has been a fair amount of controversy about a proposal to build “Stadium New Zealand”. This new sports stadium will be located in Auckland and built for the 2011 Rugby World Cup but the $300 – $1,500 million cost, depends who you believe, will endure long after that game is over. This could be considered a local issue but they are considering both “hotel bed” and “airport” taxes so tourists may contribute to this folly.

What I consider to be the most important question, "Do we actually need a 60,000 seat stadium?", seems to be beyond the debate as we simply get the choice of extending an existing stadium, Eden Park, or building on a proposed new Auckland City Waterfront site. The consultation process for this project has been crazy and shown both National & Local Body politics at it’s worst. Tonight on TV news the Mayor of Auckland mentioned taking advice, hearing voices, from the spirit of a long dead and revered former Mayor which shows how weird it, and he, has become.

I oppose the proposed waterfront location as it just seems wrong to put a massive inward focused building in such a prime harbourside location. Some people quote similar stadium locations working in Wellington & Melbourne but, although near the city & water, neither compares. This site impacts all future development in the waterfront and when that land, currently in port use, is made available for public use I’m sure a better activity can be found.

The waterfront proposal has been presented with flashy videos and artist impressions. Given the impact of a bulky/high structure the visuals seem a little bit, to be kind, “creative”.

I’m not alone in thinking this and Architect/Blogger Peter Cresswell (NotPC Blog) provides some evidence. In his post “Stadium drawings deceptive” he shows that Union House (white building with diagonal bracing – indicated by red arrow in the image) is 44m 47m high while the stadium, quoted as being 37m high, seems much shorter in the illustration. Another blogger, Whaleoil, has also commented on this comparing other measures including container crane booms and port lights, both supposed to be about about 30m, to estimate the shortfall.

Curious I decided to investigate. Using Peter’s Union House measure as a datum and the published plan, sections & height of the stadium I created a mass model in Architectural Desktop. I also traced some surrounding building plans (from an image) and used heights estimated from photos to mass them. There are many estimations in the surrounding buildings but Union House (red) is 44m 47m high & the Stadium section is scaled to 37m above ground level and as accurate as working from images allows.

I then used the Autodesk Labs AutoCAD Google Earth plug-in to create a Google Earth model. The result looks somewhat different to the artist impressions released. Have a look comparing that the red mass to the Union Building in the illustration & decide for yourself;

Is the artistic impressions use of height/perspective is rather approximate.... or creative... or maybe, deliberate?

Download Google Earth – http://earth.google.com – and the model and have a look.

File Attachment: WaterfrontStadiumAuckland47.kmz (274 KB)

Related sites & links at: http://www.waterfrontstadium.co.nz/

Have your say: http://www.aucklandcity.govt.nz/stadium/default.asp

Tags: Stadium+New+Zealand, Auckland, Waterfront, Eden+Park

New Zealands Greatest Engineering Feat - Manapouri

It was controversial in it’s day and even now the impact of the Manapouri Power Project is questioned by some. One thing you can not deny is that raising the lake, tunnelling hundreds of metres into a mountain and building a hydro scheme in one of the most remote & beautiful places in New Zealand was certainly an achievement.

Manapouri Greatest Engineering Feat
Fiordland's Manapouri Power Station has been voted New Zealand's greatest engineering feat, in a survey of University of Auckland engineering graduates.

I’ve visited Lake Manapouri and Doubtful Sound a couple of times, including a tour through the power project. Photos below show West Arm Lake Manapouri (intake), Deep Cove Doubtful Sound (outlet) from Wilmot Pass & the bus trip approx 200m below lake level to the turbine gallery. Both the natural & man-made attractions are spectacular.

The new Sony BRAVIA "Paint" Advert is...

As good as the first one!    BRAVIA – commercials.like.no.other

Sony BRAVIA - View The New Advert
The new BRAVIA TV commercial was directed by award-winning director Jonathan Glazer, who is responsible for a dazzling array of original work in the fields of commercial, music video and film production.

It required: 70,000 litres of paint, 358 single bottle bombs, 33 sextuple air cluster bombs, 22 Triple hung cluster bombs, 268 mortars, 33 Triple Mortars, 22 Double mortars, 358 meters of weld,
330 meters of steel pipe, 57 km of copper wire, 1 High-rise Apartment Block and (I’m guessing) a huge clean up afterwards!

 

UPDATE 29–10–2006: Video added, found it thanks to iplot

The retiring Type?

After a quick look to check I don't use any of them...

Daniel Mall: Typobituaries.

During a late night online conversation with another black, white, and orange website fan, it was decided that certain fonts should be retired. 

Tags: Type

Striking Peregrine

I've driven past this striking building several times but either the light or time pressure meant I haven't had the chance to photograph or visit it. It's a remarkable sight on a remarkable site.

Not PC: Peregrine Winery - Architecture Workshop.

Tonight in our architectural debate here at Not PC I'm delighted to post the fourth of Den's favourites along with his accompanying write-up. As requested by a commenter, this is one of Den's local favourites. He describes it as a "powerful and compelling" New Zealand building sitting "in an exquisite natural setting."

Tags: New+Zealand, Architecture

A logo on your PowerPoint slides is not branding

Imagine you worked for a company that had re-branded, including redesigned corporate templates. Maybe this included a PowerPoint template that ignored every bit of advice you’ve read recently about better PowerPoint design. It might use overwhelming bright colours and a huge logo on every slide overpowering a tiny area for the most important bit – the content.

Of course you could just use it or you could create a presentation that massaged that template into something more modern. Maybe slightly tone down the colour so it doesn’t shout, perhaps ignore the “approved content area” (a letter-box slot between the “branding”) and fill the slides with image(s) and as few words as possible, reduce or even remove logos from most slides…

Ok, so it’s no longer “brand compliant” but the impact has been interesting. Those who have seen the presentation have commented on the content but nobody has mentioned the missing branding; so why is it there?

I don’t know anything about branding but reading this today made me grin…

Presentation Zen: Cleaning up our act
“Try this:  If you must use your logo, do so only on the first slide and the last slide.”
“Putting your logo on every slide is like shouting your name before every new thought you have.“
“Branding is important — but a logo on your PPT slides is not branding (not even close).”

So what is branding? Jack Yan knows, what’s more he’s prepared to share – Online branding: a definitive guide.

What takes...

70,000 litres of paint
358 single bottle bombs
33 sextuple air cluster bombs
22 Triple hung cluster bombs
268 mortars
33 Triple Mortars
22 Double mortars
358 meters of weld
330 meters of steel pipe
57 km of copper wire
1 High-rise Apartment Block
1 Website
1 Blog
1 RSS Feed

Sony BRAVIA - Not “The Balls” Advert

Update 09–08–2006: Thanks to Jeff for sending this link

Interview With David Patton, Sony Europe On 'Paint'  – IF! caught up with Sony Europe's Senior VP Marketing Communications, David Patton, to explain the strategy behind the campaign.

Fiat 500 Design Competition

Fiat are running a number of design competitions to create a buzz around the launch of the new 500 (based on the Trepiuno Concept). This is a new car, due in 2007, inspired by the sexiest car in the world…

See   for details – www.fiat500.com

Radical Radial Chopper

Makes those West Coast Choppers look lame!

John Levey, Rotec Engine dealer, shows off his custom-built chopper complete with the R2800 7-cylinder Rotec aircraft engine at Oshkosh.

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