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Friday, August 05, 2011

Coop Himmelblau School 9 LA: a POE?

This Is Fascinating. Metropolis Magazine has conducted a POE on this 'out there' Coop Himmelblau school design.

They surveyed 200 students. Then the journalist / architecture critic produced this piece. It's truly interesting to compare the journalist's views with the snippets of the students' views provided by the example surveys ...

The side bar quotes are standard journalistic 'illustration'. The article itself is an interpretation of the 200 surveys. The standard Research evidence for the illustrative piece is nowhere to be seen. Personally I want to believe the journalist's conclusion: that the students like the quirkiness of the building and as arts students somehow see it as expressive of them. It's such a neat match. But then I read the survey examples. I am hard pressed to see in these how the conclusions could be drawn from the answers to these. Certainly the journalism keeps well away from any statement that might smack of statistically representing the views of the 200.

What's most disturbing about this article Is that this is a good read. It sounds convincing. It makes a convincing case - unless you think about all those students' opinions in the survey forms. For example: who is not intrigued to see the full range of opinions expressed in answer to the question complete this sentence: If I was the architect I would...

This is not a beat up about the trivialisation of information by the media. The question quoted above illustrates the problem I am sure faced the Journalist or the analyst-advisor. How on earth can anyone reasonably summarize open ended questions like that? And if there are several? It does not seem to be a well-designed survey form... It reads more like an inexperienced research student's first draft of a survey - full of interesting questions to ask, but with little clear concept of how to analyze.

Tuesday, August 02, 2011

Egypt’s Solar SLIDES House Has... (inhabitat.com)



Egypt's Solar SLIDES House Has a Transforming Perforated Facade
http://inhabitat.com/slides-perforated-skin-slides-in-and-out-to-control-solar-gain/

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Monday, August 01, 2011

Critics Take Jabs at Zaha's Olympic Stingray (archrecord.construction.com)


Hmm

Sure looks ugly at present.
But according to the Guardian ... link here
"Then, once spectators have negotiated the crowd management arrangements, which the building accommodates somewhat clumsily, they will enter a space that can only be described as stonking, "
Qq

Critics Take Jabs at Zaha's Olympic Stingray
http://archrecord.construction.com/news/2011/07/1107298-Zaha-Hadid-Olympic-Aquatics-Centre.asp?WT.mc_id=rss_archrecord

Render:


Render:


actuality:
Dezeen has best photos...




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Tips For Improve Your Renders (aleso3d.com)

Now they are saying use real settings. Not that long ago pretty render advice was all about faking it (   http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=170065

And keeping well away from setting for real light:
http://www.amazon.com/3DS-Max-Lighting-Nicholas-Boughen/dp/155622401X

Tips For Improve Your Renders
http://www.aleso3d.com/blog/?p=353
    
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A Belgian Idea of a Sustainable kit house

I was on the http://www.designbuildsource.com.au website and thought this made interesting reading...

A cube. Lots of insulation. Smallish windows. Pallet manufacture. But cheap? Like to see proof.



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Teaching Kids About the Enviro... (carbonpig.com)

Hate the "granny" tone. Ranting on about 'in our day'. Still the real question for the New Right is, since it was 'clearly' more 'efficient' for the economy to stop doing all this recycling, to whom did these efficiency measures transfer the cost of the production, re-use, and manufacture of the packaging?

M



Teaching Kids About the Environment and Sustainability
http://carbonpig.com/article/teaching-kids-about-environment-and-sustainability

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Green energy: California poll ... (latimesblogs.latimes.com)

So, what would we find in New Zealand? 

Political gain trumps science? (check out this New Zealand political view of the science: http://www.act.org.nz/climate-change-policy - it will interest people not from New Zealand to discover the party that published this document sits at the cabinet table ...!)

Or perhaps 'New Zealanders are just gullible followers of the left wing press'? http://mediamatters.org/studios/video/201107200010

In checking out references to see if I could find two viewpoints on this issue I came across the main reason I thought Fox news was a brilliant satire when I first encountered it:

Headline from Fox website:

Pirates Swashbuckle Global Warming Alarmists

Original from the ABC website said this...:

Pirates disrupting climate change research


Green energy: California poll finds overwhelming support
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/greenspace/2011/07/global-warming-green-energy-california-poll.html?dlvrit=142898

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Michael Donn
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