moshenko

It's one thing to "fill in the gaps"; it's a whole separate exercise to design something from scratch, although that wasn't necessarily the case in AVC05 (pre-existing projects could be used).

I agree with everyone's comments about not wanting to turn AVC into a technical competition. My point was that I - as a participant - felt there was a little too much "free-for-all" and that maybe AVC06 would benefit from, for instance, a single challenge being somewhat more defined.

Bear in mind, too, that there is still plenty of room for interpretation given a structure from which to base ones starting point. A challenge wouldn't necessarily have to supply the competitors with a complete working drawing set; it could be something more basic that competitors are left to detail (something that I'm sure most would both excel at and enjoy). Even if competitors were provided with a basic massing of an exterior/interior and told to make up the details, I think that would go a long way in helping to get right into the job of illustrating.

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Nicholas Moshenko
DesignStor
www.designstor.com

oliviercampagne

5 challenges were making it Big.. but it was good in a way. I kind of like it how it was. Also remenber some nights working on it listening music. Everytimes, now i hear the same music, i remenber, " That's the music of AVC " ahah.. anyway was a great time.

Is there maybe a way that the competitors all design the same "building" ? both for animation and the still.. Then they have the same base.. and the critic will be concentrate on "how they show this". I had sometimes the feeling that, last year, because the architecture was good or not.. this was influencing the result ( of course..) you know what i mean. Or maybe is to rigid this proposition... Also i see the question was raised few post before... sorry..

Scott Baumberger

FWIW, I'll through my two cents in here as well. It seems to me that this discussion could be an opportunity for the AVC to rethink its purpose - architectural visualization is not so much about the architectural design process itself as much as taking someone else's design and illustrating or communicating certain aspects of that design for a specific purpose. Great architectural renderings depict subjects that have been designed by a team of experts and have been studied and tested for a length of time. To try to create an interesting subject and render it in the time alotted is in many ways mimicking design school and not the reality of creating professional architectural illustrations.

Therefore if the AVC is a test of architectural visualization, it should remove building design from the program. This will not only allow the contestants to focus on the visualization aspects of the challenge, but it will also level the playing field and it should simplify the judging process as well. Again, it's my opinion that the competition should be as "real" as possible, and to that end the contestants should be working from the same set of drawings.

There would still be a huge amount of creativity possible, just as there is on a "real" arch. viz. project. It has been argued that there are other competitions out there for people to render pre-determined subjects. There are also competitions out there for people to design buildings. IMO, the AVC is not the place for contestants to dust off their personal designs. Let's do one thing at a time, and I think the competition will be a lot better for it.

Jeff Mottle

Thanks for all of the feedback guys, this has been invaluable. Keep it coming.

I'm working on a challenge concept at the moment that I think will encompass everyone's feedback to contain the scope of the challenges, but still leave a great deal of flexibility in interpretation and artistic freedom.

I'm actually getting really excited becuase I received word today that I will be able to use materials and concept sketches from a very cool project that was developed for a project proposal. I won't reveal too much more so I don't spoil the surprise, but I think it's shaping up to be a very cool competition this year.

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Jeff Mottle
CGarchitect.com

Jeff Mottle

Click on your AVC 2005 Judges Avatar.

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Jeff Mottle
CGarchitect.com

Ernest Burden

Working from an existing project proposal was something I was thinking about, though my idea was to not provide much more than conceptual sketches, maybe hand-drawn sketches, as a starting point. So it would allow lots of creative licence while still having everyone working off a 'program'.

OK, I wasn't smart enough to think of that, and thank you so much for pointing it out publicly. But what I meant was, how does a visitor to your site, who lands on the main page, get to the cometition pages? It is far from obvious, and those pages should be celebrated. I was further suggesting adding a tab in the header bar to go to comp. pages.

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Ernest Burden III
AcmeDigital
architectural rendering

philip kelly

I have a suggestion.............
.........can we disqualify the guys and gals who got through last year.

only joking

but I may get through this year if people like Niall browne were not in the running, no offence niall.

As much as i would love to be on thier level, I can only aspire to their work, which is not a bad thing, i picked up a few pointers last year, but I would loved to have seen the full build-up, and lighting and rendering set up ect.
it should be used as a teching form too........




phil

dbarc

I think leaving it open to interpretation in this way may defeat the purpose of having a perdefined brief in the first place. If you only had control of the building's skin for instance, you could come up with two dramatically different buildings.

I take your earlier point about the level of creativity displayed in the last competition but to me a challenge based on the realistic set of constraints which define our jobs was the biggest thing missing from the competition last year and it would be a welcome addition to rather than a replacement for the other more open challenges.

..and what Scott said much more eloquently earlier!

Brian Cassil

Scott, you make a compelling argument, and I agree with all your points about there still being room for creativity when we are given a design. But I still think that if we are given a design that is set in stone most of the entries will wind up looking a lot like each other.

I actually really like Ernest's suggestion of having sketches to work from, rather than plans. Maybe by keeping the design direction loose that would aid in the diversity of the submitted work, which in my opinion is the most important issue. Also, working from sketches and filling in the gaps actually would represent the type of work I do 90% of the time.

Scott Baumberger

I never meant that the design drawings should be set in stone. Even by the time a conceptual drawing set has been produced, the design itself has been tested and many people have been involved in its creation.

My main point is to remove the burden from the competitors of having to create a building design from scratch for the challenges. Regardless of how tight or loose the drawings are, the competitors will be free to focus on the illustrative aspects of the challenge from the beginning. As I mentioned earlier, the burden would also be removed from the judges to interpret or decipher the building design/program as they would have the same set of drawings to review.

Allowing for a certain amount of "filling in the gaps", adherence to the drawing set and brief is imperative to maintain fairness and, in my opinion, legitimacy.