Swarm intelligence 2010 fall columbia
From KokkugiaWiki
fall 2010 | columbia gsapp | roland snooks | roland@kokkugia.com
resources
columbia: SI10 schedule + tutorials
kAgent repository of code and examples
kGeom
basic kAgent code flow diagram
swarm intelligence reading
swarm intelligence links
scripting links
meshing resources
processing useful stuff
student projects
CU10 Student Template
Damon Lau - Brian Lee - Jochen Hartmann
Dan Luo - Xiao Qin - Yi Xiao
Michael Blancato - Corbin Keech - Courtney Pope
Brian Buckner - Tyler Johnson - Kurt Rodrigo - Massimilano Orzi
Eva Poulopoulou - Diego Morell Perea - Dimitra Gelagoti - Loukia Tsafoulia
Michelle O'Carroll - Anne Baker - Dan Lou
Pablo Ros - Adnan Ihsan - Hong Min Kim - Sulah Chung
Dan Babko - Chris Wei Tzu Yu - Frank Stevens - Hasan Karimi
Carson Smuts - Eleftheria Xanthouli - Kasey Josephs - Michael Gonzales
John Hooper - Heidi Werner - Juan Saldarriaga
John Hooper - Juan Saldarriaga - Damon Lau - Jochen Hartmann
syllabus
Swarm Intelligence will examine the role of agency within generative design processes. This is an experiment with the emergent architectural implications of extremely high populations of computational entities interacting within a swarm logic. The seminar will focus on an abstract design methodology, recasting simple decision making ability into agents capable of self-organizing into an emergent intelligence. The seminar will introduce the lightweight programming language Processing and build from an extensive body of existing multi-agent code. The project will explore the implications of high population thinking on the generation of architectonic assemblages, specifically exploring the dissolution of modernist tectonic hierarchies. The implications of this on fabrication and materiality will be explored, culminating with the production of a small-scale prototype.
The repositioning of design intent and the complex order generated by the behavioral techniques of multi-agent systems has implications for the affects which are generated as well as the nature of hierarchy within architecture. The distributed non-linear operation of swarm systems intrinsically resists the discrete articulation of hierarchies within Modern architecture and contemporary parametric component assemblies. The bottom up nature of these systems refocuses tectonic concerns on the assemblage at the micro scale rather than the sequential subdivision of form. Instead we will look for an alternative organization of matter that draws from an understanding of micro-structures such as those found in butterfly wings; where color and pattern are determined through the organization of matter as a geometrical configuration rather than through chemical attributes such as pigmentation.
The seminar will intensively engage scripting predominately in Processing. This work will use and expand on an existing library of agent code that will ensure that students are not slowed by the necessity of writing all the code they require. Instead the focus will be on the application and manipulation of code within the design process. This expansive library has been developed through research at Kokkugia and previous seminars. The library consists of relatively simple functions (such as steering behaviors) that can be recombined in the development of more complex algorithms.
The visual studies seminar is run in two parts Swarm 01 and Swarm 02. The first half of the semester is devoted to developing algorithmic techniques while the second half of the semester will use those techniques to question normative tectonic hierarchies through developing a multi-agent design project.
