Thomas Perugini: Serial Slice

Concept: At first I wanted to do just a geometric shape, inspired by office buildings and abstract chess pieces. However, I found the design plain and uninteresting. To give the object a more intriguing design I twisted it, adding a more organic flow to an otherwise rigid subject.

Technique: I began with a rectangular prism. On each side, a series of holes were made, each narrower and deeper than the last. This created a closed stair case design. I then twisted the entire object to give the corkscrew design. The polysurface was then separated into curves and arranged onto the cyan work area.

Material: The keyshot rendering material chosen was black walnut wood. I needed to scale down the texture a bit, as well as darken the overlay to give it a less saturated appearance. The real piece is only cardboard so far.

Charlotte Guzman-Russell: Serial Slice

Concept: For this project, I wanted to make the model very simple, fluid, and organic. I was inspired by spirals that occur in nature, such as certain seashells, ferns, and whirlpools.

Technique: I first created a rectangle and then used the Twist command in different places to distort it's original shape. I then used the Taper command to make the very top of the shape slightly smaller than the rest of it. I created two poles and set them inside the shape and then used the Contour command to slice the shape so I could later cut it with the laser cutter.

 Material: My Keyshot material is a white marble with black veins to make the model look like it was a tangible sculpture. I used a 2-ply cardboard for the actual laser cut because it is the easiest material for me to work with and also because I like way the inner structure of the cardboard looks. In the future I would like to experiment with different materials and shapes.

Jonathan Gloria: Serial Slice

 Concept: For my model concept, I got the idea from a chess piece, mostly the king or rook. I thought that making a normal chess piece would be boring, so I made it stand out a little more. In the end when I put it together with the cardboard serial slices, I also thought it looked a little like a trophy. 

Techniques: I used curves to make the shape of my model, and after I did that I used Boolean difference to make some dents to the top of my chess piece. It stared to look like a sun, so I added a sphere in the center to make it look more like the sun. I used Boolean union to merge it into the top of my model. I also used other shapes like tube and torus to cut some of the the bottom parts of my model. 

Materials: For my materials, I used different types of blue glass for the middle and bottom part of my chess piece. For the other pieces, I used a plastic blue so that everything wouldn't be see through. Since the top looked like a sun, I used gold for the top part, so that it would also reflect the light when it bounced off it in the renders.

Devon Youngbird: Serial slice

Telephone booth serial splice:

Concept: My concept for my serial splice comes from the idea of a telephone booth. The model itself is came out rather long and I wanted to do something super simple in order to learn the process of serial splicing. I hope to continue on and paint the serial splice to mimic a Tardis or a real world telephone booth.

Technique: For this model I used Maya and imported it into Rhino. In Rhino I used the contour tool to create the slices of the model to layout on the plane for laser cutting. I used a Cplane command to project the planes onto an even surface (0,0) after laying them out, so none of the curves were floating in space. I used a text tool to number each piece so I could know what was what when assembly time arrived.

Material: I knew that the materials for this piece was going to be composed of cardboard- so in keyshot I just slapped on a wood texture/material over the model to represent this. I think it captures the idea of a cardboard telephone booth- I used base color paints too to help envision what it would look like as different solid colors.

Christopher Clark: "Chest" Serial Slices

Concept- For this models concept, I designed something with the idea that the end product would be a still solid. With this in mind, I designed this chest to create a feeling of unattainability. The chest cannot be opened so it gives an uncomfortable feeling of an impossible goal, especially for those with a completionist nature.

Modeling Techniques- This was modeled using the usual booleans, fillets, and sweeps. A countour command was then used to get the the vertical slices of the outline. The outlines were than arranged into a few bounding boxes for laser cutting.

Materials-For the render, I tried to create a realistic rendition of a chest. I used a wood and leather texture for the chest and straps, and differing metals for the keyhole and handle. Gems were used for the spheres and titanitum for their bases.

Brittany Jones: Serial Slice - Dolphin or Whale Tail?

For my serial slicing contour assignment I created the tail of a cetacean dolphin/whale appearing just above the ocean surface. The initial idea of modeling a dolphin spawned from my adolescent memories of visiting my mother every summer when she lived in Panama City Beach, Florida after my parents' divorce. I especially remember a handful of somewhat rare occasions of seeing wild dolphins in the lagoon, creating my own dolphin sand sculptures a couple times when the ocean was full of seaweed, and finally getting to swim with dolphins in Jamaica on a Carnival Cruise excursion after graduating from high school.

I looked up some reference photos of dolphin sculptures, but wasn't quite satisfied with any of them until I came across this photo (below) and was inspired to just create the tail above the surface. 

 

[Image source]

As I modeled the tail, I began to think about more symbolic reasons for modeling only the tail vs. the entire ocean mammal. Besides its simplicity, I recognized the indistinctness of the form. Is it a dolphin tail? Or is it a whale tail? Above I briefly shared my memories from adolescence that relate to dolphins. Below I will share some of my present day experiences that relate to whales...

In my class presentation (before writing this blog post), I likened the tail to the top of an iceberg. We can only see what appears above the surface (when the whale needs to breathe) unless we choose to take the plunge and investigate below the surface. According to this source, "the whale symbolizes emotional creativity, well-being, nurturing as well as emotional depth." To be honest, I have been experiencing a lot of emotional turmoil during the past couple weeks. My MFA thesis project was completely attacked by my team in the same week that I found out that I had a contagious skin infection and accidentally transmitted it to my significant other. The stress became paralyzing, induced a constant bout of anxiety for two days, and caused repressed feelings to surface. It was time to face some of the deeper issues so I sought counsel. The form also represents my current internal battle with how much personal information to disclose outside my innermost circle of trusted family and friends.

So let me ask again, "Is it a dolphin tail? Or is it a whale tail?"

In regard to modeling techniques, I modeled the cetacean tail in Autodesk Maya. I used a cylinder for the base. After deleting the top triangular faces, I extruded the curve several times, scaling it accordingly, and manipulated vertices. Once I was satisfied with the shape of 1/4 of the model, I used the mirror tool to create the form. Then I exported the model as an .obj and imported it to Rhino--where I created a contoured version and prepared it for laser cutting.

For the Keyshot material, I used the light-blue, transparent gemstone material as opposed to a non-transparent colored material. In the coming months, I desire to become more transparent about creating art for therapeutic reasons. All in all, this project was quite liberating. I'm looking forward to expanding upon this theme and creating both meaningful and challenging works of art.

Renae Patoskie Week 8: Serial Slices

For the Serial Slices project I was inspired by the texture possibilities.

This technique has been used to create ambiguous, resemble contour mapping, or simply visual textures. I wanted to apply this visual texture into a common place object.

My goal was to create a similar texture to the one featured in the figure on the left, while creating a visually pleasing bowl inspired by the figure on the right.

To create this model, I created a series of 6 curves using the sketch tool. I then aligned the three surface points so that the bowl would be sufficiently balanced. I then lofted between the curves to create the outside surface. I then duplicated the surface, offset it above the outside surface and then sheared off the excess to create a flat edge on the top using the trim tool. I then used sweep two rails to create a surface between the inner and outer surfaces.

Due to the non-uniform thin outlines, it took 3 sheets of 24"x 48" mdf to print this project.

Constructed bowl from the end.

Constructed Bowl from above

Jake Lenzen - Serial Slices

For this project, I wanted to create an object from a video game. One shape that seemed particularly interesting was the Fierce Deity Sword from the Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask. The curving blade seemed like it would be easy to make with 2 strips of cardboard, while still retaining the shape that makes it iconic.

Modeling this project was fairly simple. The hilt has a straight forward cylindrical shape, though I got the scale slightly wrong. The blade I made by tracing a curve over an image of the sword. I created planes from those curves and extruded them to 0.25 thickness, then positioned them along the hilt. I used the boolean difference command to create slots for the blade to rest in, to make the attachment more secure. I then unrolled the project and fit it onto a cardboard sheet. The model turned out well, though I think I should have provided even more room for the blade to slide in, as it still wiggles a bit.