Film Course

I studied film for one year when I was at architecture school.

These some sketches from my old note book showing what ideas I had floating around in my head at the time. I needed to make a movie by using still images and to do that I researched some famous old films, like Wings of Desire, Les Enfants du Paradis, October and some Hitchcock ones like Rope. (all images are clickable)

Random models

 
 
 

Maybe I should rename my blog “Random Sketches and Photographs……and Models”!

Reflections

This is a short project I did in my first year studying architecture where we were told to find our own site and to investigate some kind of ‘boundary condition’.

So, a site anywhere in London! Anywhere you say? Well, I ended up choosing my living room and the door to the terrace. It just meant that I could be on ‘site’ a lot more and work a lot harder, I’m sure you understand. Nothing to do with not wanting to travel far or anything!

 

Initial idea, and two photos – one taken during the day and one at night.

My idea was to look at inside and outside space through my terrace door, and more specifically through the glass boundary through reflections. As the day progresses light outside gets darker of course and as a result the view towards the outside terrace and the sculpture I put there is gradually replaced with the reflected view of the inside of the room, where I was there taking photos every 15 minutes.

My interest was really to do with seeing the glass as a 2d space where the two opposite ends combine. I wanted to imagine what that flat space would look like if you were to expand it. That’s the final image which shows this hybrid space. Unfortunately, that’s the only image I could find so it will have to do. So, essentially, the end result is a collision of the two worlds on either side of the glass.

  
Sample of sketches that I made during the day. There was a set of about 40 different photos and drawings I think.

and another panel.

Bellagio Project – Extra images

This was an investigation of the city of Bellagio and the insperation was the essay the Smooth and the Striated by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari from the book A Thousand Plateaus.

Google Map of Bellagio

Bellagio and random sketches from Moscow

I spent time in a unit where the tutor (who happened to be a very famous architect) tried to push into a new way of thinking about how to make spaces and how to see a particular site. Even though I passed the course I never really felt right about the unit’s work and I told my tutor that I didn’t think what we were doing was a good way to do architecture! I said to him a lot of it seemed random to me and I could easily use the same methadology to ‘create a form’ by using data taken from how much bread was eaten by the population of the town! He took it quite well!

Anyway, this is one panel from an detailed investigation of the city of Bellagio in Italy. I admit I do like the form but I’m not sure of it’s architectural value. Maybe I’m being too harsh, I don’t know anymore.

Something a bit more interesting perhaps, some sketches from my note book. These were carried out very quickly when I was in Moscow. I tried to take one glance and put down what I thought I saw so I only got flashes of what was in front of me.

 

 

Objects of Desire – Egg Buildings

This post is about a project I worked on while in architecture school that was based on Objects of Desire. It was a long project with a lot of different ideas thrown into it.

In simple terms it was split into three stages. First stage was to design and build my own object, which ended up being a rocking chair that moves around the living room when you rock on it. Click the chair image to go to a post that explains a bit about it. Second stage was to design an object that you give away as a gift. I made a frame with an egg inside that I sent to an architect in Japan. You can click the egg image to go to a the relevant post.

 (Yes I know the blog is not very organised! If you want further proof, click the water colour trench drawing. It will take you to yet another post)

 

Last stage was to take these ideas and apply them to the city, on an artificial island in Tokyo to be more specific. Since my approach invovled looking at objects and on movement from one place to another I decided to expand on those ideas and to apply them to the island.

 

I’m going to keep it simple. The island is made up of rubbish that accumulated over the years to create the ground. From memory, the layers were made up of squashed objects that were thrown away, like old TV’s, microwaves, computers, etc. All objects of desire in a way! I thought if you were to make a long cut, or a trench, right through the island then you would get a wall that shows in layer upon layer the history of the development of the city of Tokyo. That would be something you’d see up close on a micro scale. Then, I looked around the island to things were close by, on a medium scale. I found Mount Fuji! I made some cuts and lookout points that frame the mountain and bring it into the island. Lastly, on a macro level, I thought the night sky, the planets and the stars would be my objects of desire and I made a number of planetariums that let the public see the stars up close. I know I’m probably making a complete mess of the explanation, so I’ll stay quiet now and just display some random drawings from the project.

Click the images below to expand them.

 

Mini Cinema

I am not sure what this object is called. I suppose the closest word I can think is a nickelodeon except this was your personal home version, like a VCR I guess. I had 4 drum rolls that came with it and I can remember 2 of them, which had a girl dancing and rotating and the other of a man laughing. That was it.

The big versions were used at the birth of cinema when the motion created was the main attraction. So, what you get is essentially a flip book with about hundred frames of various simple scenes. At that time people would drop a nickel (that’s why it’s called a nickel-odeon) and watch then leave when they got bored. Later somebody realised that adding a simple story would make people want to continue to use them and that’s partly how cinema started.

Anyway, I am rambling. When I was in architecture school we were asked to bring an object that we can investigate and draw. People brought different things that included a meat grinder and a plastic bird! I brought this object and I have to admit I was quite pleased with myself because it seemed like the most interesting thing there.

After drawing it in various ways we were told that the last step would be to cast it in plaster. I did that unsuccessfully as you can see by the end result and in the process I smashed the object and pretty much ruined it.

A few years later I found out that apparently only 15 were still in existance and it was a rare antique that was worth thousands of pounds!

Egg Building

I finally found the two “egg buildings” I designed based on the egg throwing project below. They are both A1 size so I need to figure out how to scan them in. In the mean time here are a few paintings of the site which a massive trench cutting across an artificial island just off of Tokyo. It’s a bit like the trench in the deathstar when I think about it now.

A list of what you do when you get to the island and the trench.

Painting – Portobello Road

This is the oil painting I did a few years ago, which my friend later tried to sell in Portobello Road market.

Egg Throw

I once worked on a project in Japan that involved a number of different stages which included designing a gift to give to a Japanese architect, a trip later where we teamed up with students in Tokyo to do a joint exercise which then ended up as an exhibition open to the public and finally I had to design an installation on an island just outside Tokyo.

The photos above represent what I did for stage one: Sending a gift.

The idea was simple. I found this egg that you throw at a fridge or something and it squishes on the surface and gradually slides down. It was a bit funny to hold. I did like how it deformed and took several pictures of me sqaushing it. Actually I remember buying a number of them from my local toy shop. The look the cashier gave me was priceless…..It was a kind of “why don’t you grow up” look!

Anyway, back to the idea. I wanted to essentially throw it to Japan and to freeze it in it’s impact point. So, I made that wooden frame above and used 2 glass panels to sqeeze the egg to simulate the point of impact. I then mailed it to the architect. He apparently loved it and sent me a present in return.

The final pic is part of the initial design stage. Somehow this egg throwing business lead to a building! Don’t ask me how because I don’t really remember.

Sketch from my notebook

More photos here: http://yfrog.com/h861i9j

Portobello Road

These are 2 sketches made many years ago when I was still a student. I remember the project had something to do with shopping and the way people behaved. I went to Portobello Road with a friend of mine to do a couple of quick experiments. My father was also there around the area at the time. I was not sure why.

Anyway, my friend I remember was investigating communication and telephone boxes. In order to get some info on the people in that area she decided to hide a recorder inside a telephone box and she taped the conversation. She also filmed the event with a camera. Our teachers when they found out about this were horrified as it was highly illegal!

I on the other had tried to sell a painting in the market. I thought people go there to buy antiques usually, what will happen if they see a painting. So I asked my friend to try and sell it while I filmed her from across the street. People gathered around me and my camera to see what I was up to. They jumped in front of the lens and acted like kids basically while totally ignoring my friend.

We waited for a few hours but nobody approached the painting. Then finally as we were about to give up two girls walked over and asked about it then went away. I am not sure what that proved but we were so happy!

I later found out that my father who was hanging around felt sorry for us and asked the girls to walk over to check out the painting! The experiment was totally compromised and I ended up feeling utterly defeated.

3 Maps

These are drawings I made when I studying three different cities for an old project. Drawn with ink in one go.

I’m not entirely sure they show anything. The only reason I put them up is because I liked the line work, plus it took me ages to complete!!

Samurai

Sketch I made a while back. I think I drew it while in a lecture I think. One of those doodles you do when your mind is somewhere else…in my case it was feudal Japan!

Just found another one. Sumo this time.

2 Photos and some drawings

I found these two photographs today taken on my trip to Moscow. Unfortunately I can’t remember what these buildings were used for but I thought they looked really out of the ordinary so I snapped them.

Also scanned 2 pages from my sketch book that I used during my time studying architecture. Looking back at them now just makes me wonder what on earth was going through my head at that time!

I eventually built the chair which can be seen here:
http://spektreman.blogspot.com/2010/06/two-images-from-my-old-architecture.html

I just remembered, when I did my demonstration by rocking on the chair to show how the thing moves I ended up hitting one of my examinars on the head with that weight stuck to that long rod!! I still passed thankfully!

2 photos and an Installation

 
First photo taken in Paris. It think that’s where Edith Piaf lived if I remember correctly. And the other taken in London of the Southbank.

 
A proposed installation in central London. School project.

Yokohama

Composition I did for a the Yokohama Port Terminal proposal. Another old student project.

School Essay

While studying architecture I spent one year in a unit that focused on film and on seeing what can be learned from it and if it can be applied to architecture. The unit was a very theoretical in its approach and I enjoyed throwing various ideas around very much. Almost too much in fact where I found myself too heavily focused on film and no so much on architecture.

Part of the course work involved writing an essay. I chose to do mine on two Hitchcock films , Rope and Vertigo. I essentially tried to understand why he used the camera in the way that he did, and if I could find anything that can be used as inspiration for the architectural project I was working on at the time. The two images above were samples of pages I drew to analyze parts of the film ‘ROPE’.

Drawing from my old sketchbook

Old Sketch from my note book. I was researching Dutch art at the time.

Building I designed

>http://www.youtube.com/get_player

A building I designed for a school project. These are only work in progress animations. I seem to have lost the final designs.

Gallery

A couple more images of my comic books gallery design.