Using OLED Lights to Enhance a Building Façade

By Nicholas Mosher

            In select cities where there are skyscrapers that can be seen for long distances, lighting is used for decoration and entertainment along the facades of the massive buildings.  By simply turning on the lights in select rooms, basic words and images can be made to capture the attention from the people around.  More advanced system include using 4D projectors which animate the facades and turn them into giant movie screens where images can be clearer and in color.  This technology is very expensive and involves a projector to be placed far from the actual building possibly onto another property of land. 

            Meidad Marzan has created a product called the Urban Tile where they are placed on permanent rods and on one side is covered in photovoltaics and the other side has an OLED light.  A single tile is roughly around the size of a nine inch square where the rod pierces the center of the sides of the tile.  Many tiles are placed on a rod but each tile has an electric motor which allows them to move individually.  With many tiles on many rods, together they create a giant screen where each one acts like a pixel¹. 

Image taken from Gizmag.com

Image taken from Gizmag.com

The image above shows what a building looks like at night with several hundred of these Urban Tiles operating together.  Aside from still images, the use of either rotating the panels or just turning the lights on and off, an animation can also be created.  This can make a building come alive and capture the attentions of people all around.  During the daytime, the tiles are rotated in a way that the photovoltaics are facing the sun as much as possible.  This allows the batteries to charge for the OLED light at night.  Also, the tiles act like blinds where it can block sunlight from entering the interior or let sunlight inside. The photovoltaics can still capture energy from the sun even when it is not fully facing the sun¹.  It is effective because the OLED lights require little energy compared to other electric light sources such as incandescent bulbs.  However, they are not as energy efficient as fluorescent bulbs or LED lights, they also do not shine as bright as those.  This makes for a good use on buildings because the light is not overpowering to the people that can see it. 

            Due to the fact that the OLED lights are powered by the photovoltaics, this can be a problem if there are clouds during the day.  If there is no sun then there cannot be any energy captured and converted.  Unless the system of tiles was also connected to the grid or a backup electrical supply, then there would be a limit on using the lights every single night.  The use and development of a system like this can improve its flexibility to beyond just 2D rectangles.  Architecture can adapt to using lighting systems like this interactive façade to create imagery and messages along surfaces and affect how they want people to feel and relate in spaces and communities.

Notes:

1.      Steven Hondrogiannis. (September 2, 2011) Urban Tile Window Blind ConceptFuses Solar Panel with an OLED Screen.  Gizmag.com. http://www.gizmag.com/solar-panel-fused-with-an-oled-screen-makes-an-urbantile/19683/

Post Mid-Review

By Lauren Hale

Well we are past mid-reviews.  Oh and FYI, we work on the same design project all semester and when we are halfway through we present what we have to get feedback on where to go from there.  There were definitely semesters where I found myself completely redesigning and overhauling based on what the reviewers said in the mid-review.  Thankfully this one went really well.

We presented as a group but we showed our group efforts and individual efforts in the same presentation.  First was the master plan.  We designed three city blocks in downtown Chicago as a group of three.  Then within our master plan we each designed one particular building.  I’m designing a rather tall hotel, and I have a feeling with all the additional floor thickness because of HVAC ducts and structural systems it is just going to keep getting taller, but I guess we will find out here very soon. 

Overall, the presentation went very smoothly.  We had a guest reviewer on the day we presented.  His name was Steve Schlickman and he’s the head of the UIC Urban Planning department so he knows Chicago inside and out.  He really liked our concept and ideas, models, and drawings which was very encouraging.  He just asked us a few questions about how we plan to address some things.  One of them was directed to my building because I have a hotel on a triangular site with a train going right through it.  It has been a challenge but not impossible.  So far the structural grid has taken the longest because you can’t put a column on the tenth floor that’s going to be right where the train runs through on the first three floors.  He basically asked how I plan to address the noise.  I’m not positive yet but there are plenty of precedents on buildings with trains going right through them, such as the Student Center on Illinois Institute of Technology’s campus, by Rem Koolhaus.  There are noise-reducing rubber tracks that can be laid down instead of the metal ones but there will still be some amount of noise.  I also plan to start the floors with guest rooms in them a few storeys above the train; hopefully the noise will not travel that far. 

The other question he asked us was about how we plan to connect Rush University Medical Center more with our plan.  We did say in the presentation that we have a medical area with clinics and therapy gardens and some other program.  He was wondering about a more physical direct connection from our site to Rush.  There is a huge highway right in between our site and Rush however.  We considered his suggestion but we won’t be physically addressing the highway with our master plan. 

Overall, the whole mid-review went very well.  We did have to deal with technology issues, like internet connection, glare on the screen, not knowing how to use Adobe Connect.  We were being videotaped and filmed for a live broadcast over the internet. We haven’t gotten to watch the footage yet and I’m not sure I want to, who knows how embarrassing that will be.          

A finger and an opposable thumb.

By Randy Thoms

            Coming from a construction background, much of “school” reinforces what is out in the field, but also falls short.  There needs to be more “hands-on” experiences.  Not just interning in an office, but in the actual building trades.  You have not lived until you smashed your thumb with a hammer and said a few choice words.  The building tech courses here have been great to show how a building goes together.  But even I feel I could learn more with coursework on building codes, the mass of a building and “best practices” of design that still need to be addressed.

            During my design process, much of the time I start from the basis of “how is this going to be built?” and “how expensive and efficient is this structural system?”  It keeps me grounded, but at the same time I feel it limits me as well.  I work through the problem looking at the big, whole picture…much what an Architect is supposed to do?...and not get too lost is the free-form design or unbuildable building.  So that is where the limits stem from, I do not allow myself to push the envelope, go beyond my comfort zone.  Does this make me a better designer?  Maybe I will always fall within my client’s budget, which is a good thing, right?  Maybe I will always be efficient and sustainable, which is a good thing, right? 

            Ever since a youngster, I always enjoyed building-construction and buildings- spaces, facades, plazas, etc.  I always wondered what the builder and architect (when I found out that is who designs the buildings) were thinking about or motivates them?  As well as the human scale of construction.  With my travels through Europe, seeing all those cathedrals and churches, large and imposing, one can be only in awe.  It is no wonder the church has such power.  Who would not be inspired, or afraid, of such structures and institutions? 

            But, no matter how tall, big or deep a structure may be, it all comes down to two things, sometimes five and at other times, ten. I am talking about the human hand…those fingers and thumbs.   With all the tools, technology and materials, it still take the relatively small human hand to assemble these large structures.  By holding a wrench to erect iron beams, to spinning a nut on a bolt, to holding a hammer and a nail it all comes down to ten items.  From pecking away on a computer and getting finger cramps from rolling the mouse wheel back and forth for endless hours, to holding a pencil, yes sometimes architects use pencils and markers, and drawing on a napkin, it all comes together with a finger and an opposable thumb.

Historical Research

by Lani Walker

Currently in the Master’s level class ARC 500 - Research Methods, we are learning about the different types of architectural research and the numerous ways to perform this research.  The book we are using, Architectural Research Methods by David Wang and Linda Groat, covers seven types of research, including historical, qualitative, correlational, experimental, simulation, logical argumentation, and case studies and mixed methods.  This week we have focused on Chapter Six in this book; historical research.  This article below is a collection of the terms and practices I learned from Chapter Six this week.  In this chapter, perspectives, theories, and strategies in historical research are analyzed. 

Traditional and new perspectives on historical research are formed from a fictional account from the past, a historian’s viewpoint or interpretation of the past, or a narrative and other literary forms.  The ‘new’ perspectives in the current practice of history are based around two influential bodies of theory.  The first theory is the ‘cultural turn,’ where historians seek to interpret cultural meaning from cultural anthropology.  The second theory, the ‘spatial turn,’ derives from various social theories, especially the Marxist theory.  In both theories, physical objects and the physical space become key issues in historical analysis. 

               In analyzing the perspectives on historical research, it is imperial to understand how the history is narrated and if the information is valid.  Some historical narratives might overstep into the bounds of fiction.  The three perspectives on historical research include the historical narrative, literary constructions, imagination and comprehension.  In the historical narrative, the narrator describes their account of a past experience.  In literary constructions, the idea of the ‘ideal chronicle’ in examined.  In imagination and comprehension, human thought is compared to animal nature. 

            The schools of thought in historical research have evolved with the ever-changing culture.  The positivist explanation bases human knowledge solely on the scientific interpretation of observational data.   Another school of thought in historical research is the ‘movement of spirit,’ in which all people and things are imprisoned in their own time frame.  This approach explains how an event can only truly be judges in the time period in which it took place.  The structuralist approach focuses on the universal truths that occur as the overall system of historical research evolves.  The poststructuralist approach examines the people and institutions in power within a places history.

            While doing historical research in architecture, certain strategies can be applied to assist in successful research methods.  Strategies in historical research include determining fact verses opinion and realizing biases in literary works.  It is important to find the determinative evidence; facts of who, what, when, where, and why.  While finding determinative evidence, historical research also uses contextual evidence, inferential evidence, and recollected evidence.  Contextual evidence is provided by cultural factors and the context in which the event took place.  Inferential evidence makes a connection between two seemingly different pieces of historical evidence found.  Recollective evidence is evidence that is recorded, with the exclusion of hearsay. 

            Perspectives, theories, and strategies in historical research, as examined in chapter six of Architectural Research Methods, can be used as a guide for preforming successful architectural research.  These methods in historical research can be implemented in many of the architectural thesis projects currently being researched within the graduate studio.  Research is a crucial tool that architectural graduate students must learn in order to effectively address the technical, aesthetic, and behavioral issues that arise in their architectural work.

Losing Touch

By Tyler Dunahee

"Dear architects,

You’re outdated. I know this because I once was one of you. But now I’ve moved on. I moved on because despite your love of a great curve, and your experimentation with form, you don’t understand people.

I correct myself. You don’t listen to people."

               

                This was the opening to an article I just finished reading titled "Why I Left the Architecture Profession" by Christine Outram on the ArchDaily website (I'll include a link at the end of this post).  The article was eye-opening in one sense, however, it was almost expected as some instructors in the architecture program here at SIU have discussed issues the author of this article has issue with.  She basically accuses the majority of architects and firms of being out of touch with what the people using the building truly need stating,

 "... the truth is, most of you don’t try. You rely on rules of thumb and pattern books, but you rarely do in-depth ethnographic research. You might sit at the building site for an hour and watch people “use space” but do you speak to them? Do you find out their motivations? Do your attempts really make their way into your design process?"

                Her accusations also include not utilizing all of the new, powerful tools that are now at our grasp, nor do we try to perfect old methods and techniques.  She uses Starbucks as a comparison to the architecture profession as a whole.  Starbucks takes comments from their consumers and uses them to design to, take, for example, their round tables.  The round tables were a result of asking the question how do we want people to feel before considering what do we want them to do.  The thought behind the round tables is the comfort for those there alone, there are no empty seats at a round table.  She does not believe architects, in a general sense, take this step in their design, and if they do, they employ old methods of doing so, ignoring the capabilities of new methods, allowing for vast polling, et cetera, very simply and easily.  She does believe most residential architects have the capability of designing to ones needs, however, on larger scales, commercial, healthcare, governmental buildings, this is lost.  She discusses the hardships in which Santiago Calatrava, a widely celebrated architect,  has put a number of cities with his flawed, and sometimes dangerous, designs.

                In ARC500: Research and Methods with Professor Craig Anz we have discussed how our ultimate goal as an architect is to "Do No Harm".  This "Do No Harm" sentiment is nothing new, as it was published in an American Institute of Architect's article, the author stating it as the new Architect's Standard of Care.  In this class we have also discussed the lack of post-occupancy evaluations (which Outram also brings up). Post-occupancy evaluations are an evaluation to see how the flow and spaces truly worked for people, if they worked at all, as to not repeat mistakes if the design did create errors.  However, very few firms actually take the time and money to investigate if their designs worked, and instead just assume they did, because we're architects, and we know what we are doing.  I do not mean to be so condescending to the profession in which I hope to practice, however, there are a number of issues within the profession. Correcting these issues could make architecture a much stronger profession and architects revered once again, instead of just a necessity to get all of the drawings stamped.

Here are the links:

Why I Left the Architecture Profession: http://www.archdaily.com/440358/why-i-left-the-architecture-profession/

A Star Architect (Calatrava) Leaves Some Clients Fuming: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/25/arts/design/santiago-calatrava-collects-critics-as-well-as-fans.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

Educational Design

By Phil Mevert

One of the big trends in designing schools and other learning environments over the last several years has been to provide natural daylight to the classrooms and other active spaces within the building. While some may believe this is a grand and new idea, this idea was a major part of school design as far back as the late19th century. The use of natural daylight in school design in the early years of school construction had to do with the lack of electricity more than anything, however it was still well thought out how and where to place windows. With the focus and necessity of natural daylight within the school design the development of standards for window heights and offsets from the floor began to prevent shadows in the classrooms.  Window sills should not exceed 3’-6” above finish floor to allow for those inside to rest their eyes by looking out into the distance. [1]  Over the last 100 plus years school design many different ideas and configurations of providing natural daylight into buildings. Some classrooms have been designed with floor to ceiling windows to not just allow daylight in but to provide a connection with the outdoors as well. There was even a time in the 1970s and into the 1980s where in reaction to the energy crisis some schools were being designed without windows to try and control the heating and cooling with mechanical systems and to not allow solar heat gain. Today the use of natural daylight in the design of educational facilities is becoming a pretty common practice however; the size and method for bringing the light into the spaces can vary from designer to designer based on climate and research.  With the advancement in light dispersing tubes it is now possible to provide natural daylight into interior spaces that do not have access to an exterior wall. As the effects of daylight on the learning environment progress it will allow designers to create the correct amount of daylight to enhance learning ability. It has already been noted that in rooms where students have more daylight their academic scores are anywhere from 7-18% higher than the rooms with less daylight.[2]

As daylighting research has increased and the quality of the light fixtures has increased, so has the way spaces are heated and cooled. The original way to control temperature in a school room use to be to provide vents that would allow natural air to ventilate the spaces. As mechanical systems progress it became easier to use forced air to heat and cool spaces. It is also important that the temperature should not be less than 68 degrees F or higher than 74 degrees F in a room designed for learning. With most heating and cooling systems today, the units will have fresh air intakes that help to provide a better quality air to the occupants. However, one thing will always be true, “however perfect the heating and ventilating plant, and however faultless its operation, let it be clearly understood and always remembered that no artificial heating and ventilation can ever take the place of fresh outdoor air and sunshine” (Hamlin,1910, p. 9).1

                As the class sizes in schools began to increase, so did the size of the classrooms and the amount of noise within the rooms. It became very important to mitigate the noise volumes to allow better concentration during class. Today a great deal of time is spent trying to decrease the amount of noise in all rooms of school buildings. Some of the most common solutions are to provide softer materials on the walls and ceilings and in some cases even on the floor. The softer building materials tend to absorb the sound rather than reflect it.

[1] Baker, Lindsay. “A History of School Design and its Indoor Environmental Standards, 1900 to Today.” National Clearinghouse For Educational Facilities. www.ncef.org

2 Bloom, Susan. “Let the Sun Shine In: The Value of Daylight.” ieslightlogic.org. (2012)

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[1] Baker, Lindsay. “A History of School Design and its Indoor Environmental Standards, 1900 to Today.” National Clearinghouse For Educational Facilities. www.ncef.org

[2] Bloom, Susan. “Let the Sun Shine In: The Value of Daylight.” ieslightlogic.org. (2012)

Architecture Photography as an Art

– Timothy Shotts      

I commonly document my models with photos – we all should.  Document Everything!  Models are fragile and you might not get a chance to borrow your friend’s SLR camera and take some quality shots before something tragic happens.  I feel comfortable changing the focal length to blur the background, and I can frame a photo with the worst of them, but that’s where my photography skills end.  Did you know that Peter Smith may offer Architectural Photography class in the spring?   I would love to see the gallery and hallways filled with photos from that class!

Until that class is offered…

A quick online search turned up a couple photography sites with tips for successful architecture photography.  http://digital-photography-school.com/architectural-photography and http://www.fotoblur.com/blog/1/architecture-photography-tips .  Unsurprisingly, I also found this http://photographyandarchitecture.com/, and on their Who, What, Why page:   “Architects live and die by the images that are taken of their work”.  We are photography industry professionals with a love for architecture. Great architects need great photographers and our goal is to help them find each other. (http://photographyandarchitecture.com/who-what-why/ ).  You want to be a great architect, right?  Of course you do!  I’ve found that the folks in photography department are more than willing to help photograph your models.

From http://digital-photography-school.com/architectural-photography, here are their 9 tips summarized.

1.     Be conscious of lighting, contrast, shadows, textures, and reflections.  Also, bracket shots at different exposure values and use a photo editing program to merge them.

2.    Get a fish-eye or wide-angle lens to capture the building in its environment.

3.    Don’t forget the inside.  If natural light levels are low, use a long exposure.

4.    Take dusk and night-time photos too.

5.    The photo can be great even if the weather’s not.

6.    Reflections add an extra dimension to architecture photos.  Seen the Bean?

7.    Research the architecture and find an important detail to photograph.

8.    A large f-stop will retain detail near and far.  A small f-stop will reduce the sharpness of either the foreground or background.

9.    Images should be dynamic as well as aesthetic and graphic.  Look for hierarchy, symmetry, composition, and combine curves and straight lines.

Below is a photo I took at the Du Quoin State Fair during the summer of 2013.  Holly was awarded the blue ribbon in Architecture Photography.   Notice the contrast between the shadows in the arch and the skyscraper that is nearly washed-out in light, the capture of detail on the arch, a small f-stop to retain detail, and curved lines mixed with straight.

Photo by Holly Glosser