ComponenteDevoto_processing

In these weeks, i've met or talked to several people. I publish a summary, in order to explain at what level the project is.

1_first time at Devoto's

I went to mr.Devoto for my very first time 3 weeks ago.

I wanted to submit him this new constructive idea, based on vertical section rather than orizontal ones. He found this solution far better and so we had a very intense design meeting.

This sketch was made by me and mr. DEvoto. It Represents a possibility for my acoustic shell. I showed these sketches to Stefano and he drawn (top pencil sketch) a scheme of Gehry's Art Gallery in Toronto furnitures, which have a language very close to my constructive system.

After understanding the constructive idea, Devoto showed me lot of potential materials.

Among them i picked up this gorgeous matter: Compact HPL black core. I will use it for making dividers in my schroeder's RPG profile. It has a center core plus two faces with a finishing. In a sheet therefore he shows both its face and its core, something very interesting for me.

One of the most impressing potential of this material is that in my design it will generate a vibration of colour (lot of vertical slices at the same distance + perspective). This propriety can be furthermore highighted by an artificial lightning -grazing?-. Each hole shall be closed by a wooden divider, which i imagine painted black like the side of HPL. In this way i imagine this scretched surface.

HPL is worked on the edges in this very interesting way -hand made left, raw right-. I think this way of making it is excellent and highlights dramatically his own nature of matter with finished faces and raw core.

This material has his own cost, which is not low (24€/sqm). I proposed therefore to mr. Devoto not to use it as a rib (left sketch): rather is cold be used where it is seen (in rpg and in the base-right sketch).What i realized is that in this way it exists a sort of contraddiction between the rpg diffusing system and the the sitting system. Rpg could work even all alone, giving an excellent contribution to the whole ambient acustics, but it is in my very first and original  idea making something that improves acoustics in the near field, the one of people sitting on it. I've starded so thinking about how to design an integrated system.

Building up furnitures departing from vertical slices has two kind of problems, according to me.The first one is that the system is in the end very expensive, especially if slices are tiny sheets, like in Toronto Gallery: futhermore i do not like this way of using matter as well, because it does not highlight the potential face-core of HPL (unproper use of material). On the other hand a far more significant problem is that glueing toghether slices do not allow to curving the furniture in plan. By curving, i mean making an angle as well.

2_Acoustic issues

I would like to thank very much ing. Serafino DiRosario, an italian sound engeneer of Buro HAppold's which is giving a substantial aid to the project developement. I've had the chance to speak to him two weeks ago, furthermore we are in contact via mail.

Since sound wave lenght deal with dimension of the 4d space in which we live, wavy phenomena are extremely important for most of acoustic sitations (something which is not for light, for instance): dealing with these implies a certain use of "scale".

The "scale" problem has a couple of face. At first, the object shall be big enough in order to be literally "seen" by sound waves. Moreover, listener's distance from sound source (rpg is a virtual omnidirectional source) is extremely important for the mechanism of sound perception. Both of these aspects have to be taken strongly into account when designing something that works not on material but on form: more precisely changing the fase of a certain amount of sound pressure which enters in this -rather than that- RPG hole.

Ing. Di Rosario explained me a couple of things upon this point.

At first, he explained that mechanism of spatiality perception is related to difference in sound level between two ears for frequencies above 400HZ (Interaural Level Difference, ILD), while it is based on Time difference for lower frequencies (ITD). He suggested me to set the frequency range for which my compontent works on 300Hz-5000Hz or-more conservative- 400-4000Hz. Because of production problems (dimensions are too high), i shall work on conservative range.

Furthermore, he explained me that sound diffused is not clearly -in a diffused way- perceptible under a certain distance from the source (rpg plane in our case): something realted to cycle phenomenon. This distance can be quantifiable as something between half of and 3/4 of wavelenght. LOOK AT COMMENTS

WAVELENGHT=SPEED OF SOUND / FREQUENCY

My signficant wavelenght is 85cm (400Hz). What happens now is that my object shall be at least 170cm wide (twice the WL), while in order to make the listening better, listener shall be at least 45 cm far from RPG plane.  LOOK AT COMMENTS This second condition is really annoying. At present I'm discovering other phenomena Ing. diRosario Talked me about.

3_possibilities?

I've modeled my rpg system with Revit2010. In this new release, it is possible to use splines and drive point to that geometry. i still do not know what happen with the angle: therefore i've set up my model in order to have a variation in plan.

In order to reach 170cm i put several schroeder period profiles side by side. At present i do not know wheter: 1- this variation produces a loss of diffusing proprieties of the element (one period is too little- so the component is simply reflecting) 2- this variation can be controlled somehow and gives something more to the diffusing mechanism.

I think the first one is more realistic, and so the only way on playing with an angle shall be putting two or more 170cm modules toghether. I really hope that it will be possible to make better acoustic with only one module's angles variation as well. In order to do undertand this, i will test my compontent with FEM software whose name is COMSOL. In the next weeks i will try and understand how does it work.

4_horizons

This logo shows a possible language i would like to use in the project. It's about a simple contraddiction of signs between RPG and sitting: This can be realised departing from 4cm thick wood nested (or milled somehow-with stuff sits) painted differently face and side, like HPL.

In this paper sketch i submitted last week to mr.Devoto, i show possible perspectives for my component: because of the 45cm problem it could be better used (less combersome) not with an integrated armchair, but as a plane for bar stools -left sketch. It will be vital to manage the45cm space in a clever way.

This rough sketch shows how it could look like. But it is too rough, i need to work far more on it.