REFLECTION

This course - ARCH 1142 Architectural Communications has been an exciting and interesting journey. It serves as a good continuation from BENV 1080 Enabling Skills which I took in the previous academic semseter. The course was conducted in a comprehensive manner - delving into the areas of model-making, colour, animation and black and white drawing generally as some of the communicative modes and representational methods.

The first workshop that I did was concerning the use of charcoal and black ink drawings to constitute ideas of space and movement. The use of these two mediums which are new to me, was a delightful experience for me. I have learned to be more bold and confident, honest in translating the visual experience onto drawing, perceiving the qualities of light intensity, and improve my drawing skills. The tasks done also kept me in deep thoughts about the things which I want to represent in my drawings and the results are 14 drawings compilated in black foam core tied with brown jute string.

The second workshop that I participated in was to do with the concept of drawing and scanning drawn images to form an animation storyboard. I wanted to revisit the idea of space which I did in the previous workshop and also insert the idea of time in my animation. The focus was on Red Centre, and in my drawings, I attempted to describe how time pass as the camera view gradually turns from the East wing of the building to the West wing of the building, and how the connection is made with architectural students doing their work in a certain area inside the Red Centre. While I contrast the vastness of space outside Red Centre with the limited working space inside Red Centre, I also gave an account of the changing time mainly by the interplay of light and shadows. I also wanted to record the idea that the work time passes very fast, and the subsequent party time was a much prolonged one. This is to impose the idea that students usually remember the after effects after assignments are done and don't get to remember the process as well. I am satisfied with the product, and I hope to be able to take and apply knowledge that I have learned from this workshop.

Atlas of Colour was the final workshop that I took. I chose this workshop because I am naturally inclined to colour production since young. The workshop was a good eye opener for me to realize that there are many ways of presenting ideas which is certainly an advantage for me in the future. There is a need to be aware of all these creative and explorative techniques of generating presentations like collage and face mapping. I enjoyed this subject to a great degree because of the new and challenging ideas and knowledge that were contained in the syllabus.

I feel extremely optimistic after attending the aforementioned three workshops as they were all beneficial and meaningful. I hope that this course would be maintained and refined from time to time to be a good and effective arena for many.

Workshop 2: Atlas of Colour

The purpose of this workshop was to establish a basic understanding of colour and to stimulate the interest of students to develop their ideas of colour in several different yet complementary area of studies.

Given the theme color of apple green and instructions, I was keen to explore how this colour relates to my given tasks, its relation with other hues, and how it is used to construct my atlas as a balanced whole.

Below are images of my final production:



Selective contents from my produced atlas



Top view of the atlas. Atlas uses accordion-styled binding.



Side view of the atlas



The tunnel section of the atlas

I enjoyed all the sections of this atlas and I believe that they evoke their own uniqueness and establish a link between themselves and the other sections. The most significant thing that was impressed upon me when I took off with this assignment was the notion of symmetry, balance, simplicity, and elegance as featured in Herzog and de Meuron's book Natural History. The precedent book became a vital source of inspiration for my atlas production.

Indeed, colour is a very important element in design and I will take from whatever I have studied for the four weeks and implement those ideas into my designs in the days to come.