CompuServe Messages

As a graduate student at Georgia Tech in Architecture, I would say I probably have a good feel for what is going on in Architectural education here. When I began working on the extended degree program 3 years ago, there were 2 ACAD courses offered (1 required) for students in the college of architecture. 3Dstudio was being used by one student, (who actually ended up winning an Adesk image award for a still of a Japanese shrine with version 1), and the use of CAD in studio was pretty much discouraged. The reasons for these policies were valid in some ways, but behind in many. About 2 years ago, a few students who had seen the 3dstudio work began taking 3dstudio as a quarter long independent study. A total of 4-5 people had taken the course when I began about a year and a half ago. Since that time, a full course has been implemented and about 50 more students have completed the 3dStudio course. The path has definately been exponential. As more of the students in the architectural program see the results of students who are working in this medium, the course is constantly full. Strange as it may sound to those architects out there reading this, I have designed and presented 3 quarters worth of studio projects in 3dstudio and acad, and I haven't made a physical model or used a parallel bar since. I do not say this because I believe these tools to be unnecessary now, only because these projects lent themselves to the use of 3ds as both the design tool and production device. I venture to say that this is not the rule, but there are several others in the program who are also fully "caught up" in using 3ds as a design tool and for final output. There is also a great deal of change in the way professors are viewing these tools. While at first it was an uphill battle to convince them of its value to the design process and even to the final output, I am now requested to make regular models and animations for study throughout the process (now I have the problem of convincing them that we need better machines for me to do that much work!!) We at GATech have also just purchased 10 machines to be placed directly in the graduate studios (unfortunately, 8 of them are powermacs, only the ones in the thesis studio, mine, are Pentiums 90's). We also have a studio devoted to exploring and producing its' entire year on the computers, with an exhibition at the end of the period to display their projects. I am not trying to say that overnight, things have changed, only that it seems that we are beginning to see some real changes sooner rather than later. I have found that the easiest way to convince a professor that a tool like 3ds is necessary is to show them something that cannot be demonstrated any other way. This may be realistic reflections, lighting, transparencies or very likely, animations. By dealing with the dynamic nature of a project and its' surroundings, you will suddenly see a lot of converts. Another area that can be exploited is the ability to expand your focus from a relatively small "site specific" context, to a much larger expanded surrounding. We here at Tech are working on a project modeling the entire downtown and expanded areas of Atlanta. This enables students to use the data and the visual related information from the very beginning of their design. They are able to start to see relationships from camera angles only a plane could offer before, as well as any number of other advantages. Well, sorry for such a long message, just thought I would throw in a students perspective. Doug