A01 - The Cube

Description:

Assignment A01, "The Cube," was intended to teach us to utilize a) Rhino to manipulate a cube in a series of volumetric additions, subtractions, and other transformations and b) Illustrator to take 2D diagrams of axonometric and plan/elevation views of the cube and emphasize line weights to create depth. Through the 16-step morphology of the 10'x10'x10' cube, we were able to thoroughly explore the curve, surface, and solid editing tools in Rhino. I used the tools to design various abstract and geometric manipulations that were built on each previous version of the cube. Upon extraction of the 2D drawings to Illustrator, I deliberately chose a single version of the cube that I felt would best show multiple kinds of tool usage as well as three distinct views that would give the most information about the cube. The void diagrams at the bottom right show the various types of forms and spaces that can be created using the editing tools in Rhino. 

Thoughts:

I had a pretty good time making this cube. I didn't have any sort of preordained plan or desire to create some specific shape; I just wanted to test out the tools and see what kinds of things could be made. Things were pretty smooth sailing up until the Twist iteration, which is when things got a little messy. It turns out that twisting the extruded point I made previously will cause gaps when you try to line up the point again. It caused a lot of frustration when I was trying to use BooleanDifference later on and especially during the line weighting and color blocking in Illustrator because of the complicated outlines. 

Color blocking itself went okay; learning how to use Live Paint and do shades of colors took some time but it was a smooth routine once I figured it out.

I also ran into some trouble with the void diagrams, particularly with the volumetric axon. Because of the uneven planes due to the Fold iteration, the partial sphere took a lot of picky solid-editing to boolean out. The BooleanDifference-from-a-whole-cube method didn't work so I ended up having to make a very specific and small prism around the sphere and boolean it out from there.

Review:

Pros: the board turned out pretty well. I was mostly pleased with the font that I chose (District), as it's just the type of clean and minimal that I like. 

Cons: for some reason, I can never get the hang of InDesign and all my placed diagrams were fuzzy. It was suggested that I should have done them as various artboards in Illustrator, so I'll try that next time. The font sizes for the move labels were also a little big and bold, something that I didn't foresee when creating the poster.