April 2024 – 🌮️Yelena's 🥥 (2024)

We got the inspiration of the spine from one of Zendaya’s looks:

To make it strong enough to hold plants, and at the same time be able to pull the fabrics, I thought of the NASA fabric Lisa made last semester. Here is the reference:link | tutorial for how to make it in rhino & grasshopper – link | Lisa’s work last semester – link

The tutorial inspired me to look into the list functions because I want to make intersections for each unit.

These commands probably look like very nonsensical, but after trying for a whole day, this is the best I can do (so far). In the process, I tried to learn how to use loop function in grasshopper (but failed). I also had a better understanding of the list/ cross reference/ tree. (things that I should have learned better last sem

I think the challenge with this nasa fabric is that we only need one line of units instead of an area of those units. With an area, each one of them can intersect with each other.

Another important lesson learnt: offset the surface in grasshopper won’t necessarily create a surface with thickness. Have to use the Offset Surface in the Pufferfish plugin.

In-Class exercise

I followed the tutorial video step by step 😀

the picture on the left is actually one of my favorite screenshot from the documentary. It is just so sarcastic that this male audience was trying his best to see what is going on on the stage.

The media presentation of certain race/ gender is indeed really powerful in shaping the public’s perception of that certain group of people. There are many theorists and critics criticizing on the lack of presentation/ misrepresentation. I remember learning about Bell Hooks in my freshman year.

I really really like this topic because I think I am the victim of this “societal norm” or “familial expectation”. I don’t understand (actually I hate) how Chinese people like to comment on other people’s body shape, especially their family members’. I grew up being the chubby kid in my family. And every time we had family reunions, when meeting with those relatives that I only met once or twice a year, they (mostly males) commented on my body shape. In 2022 after ~3 months of Shanghai lockdown, I finally met my father and we were walking together. At that time there was also a case that a few young girls were violently beaten in a restaurant around 2 am in China. My dad was trying to educate me about protecting myself AS A GIRL, and all of a sudden he said, well, anyways, you are not the pretty type to get assaulted. These experiences all in some ways, contributed to my eating disorder. ((But it’s okay I am getting thereeee, almost

Ironically, after I finally lost a lot of weights and got skinny, all of a sudden, everyone started to be like, YOU NEED TO EAT MORE/ YOU NEED TO DO THIS YOU NEED TO DO THAT.

Funny 🙂

I really want to do a project on eating disorder, self-love and our perceptions on our own body. Because there are just so many people experiencing the same thing as I did, and it can even get fatal. Sometimes the society is putting too much unrealistic, toxic expectations on us, and we internalize them. Maybe one day, when I can fully embrace my body and embrace who I am, I will do that :D.

• This week we learned how to use grasshopper (for me it is a review :)) and how to print on the fabric. The function I found particularly useful is rebuild. Rebuild helps with recreating the curves (eg: set the curve point number). I actually used rebuild a lot when modeling for my Frida 😀
• 
• I don’t know what to print, so I want to experiment with optical illusions and I decide to make a Frida Kahlo.
• I downloaded the image online and divided it into 20 strips with Illustrator. Afterwards I used a rhino extension called Vectorize (link) to trace the image. I experimented several times but it wasn’t really good. So I gave up and manually made the curves and the surfaces.
• It doesn’t look bad in rhino. And the printing process was better than I thought, because since the fabric is not flat, I was really afraid that there might be errors. The only flaw is that the fabric moved its position a bit. I think it was because that the whole piece is really thin, so there weren’t many errors. If I made it thicker, it might be more difficult to print.

How to apply this technique to our piece

After talking with Korrina Tuesday night about our skirt idea, we decided to use the origami pattern for our skirt. It is not a good sketch, but basically, the right part will be the origami where plants are growing out. Here are also some pinterest inspo to explain our vision.

Here are some research I’ve made. Haven’t put them into practice yet because I don’t have time ;; but will try them out soon!

I also found posts about the pattern Lisa made last semester (the NASA’s pattern?).

Updates on the notion page

This week, so far, we spent a lot of time making the top and experimenting with the 3D printer.

Plant Plate

I created the surface and extruded them later. I used the command ptPanelGridCustom and selected the hexagon I made previously. I think the hexagon got deformed a bit because of the grid I have created.

Other experiment with Paneling tools:

A (Random) Wearable

ptGridSurfaceDomainNumber –>ptOffsetPoints (distance – random) –> ptPanel3DCustom (the shape is the random one next to it) –> pipe (for the offset points, because I connected them together)

In-class exercise

I always forget the ptPanelGrid. For this one, I used ptPanelGrid & multi-pipe

Final Project Documentation

I created a notion page for documenting the progress. Right now it is still under construction. Will publish it after everything is done~ https://www.notion.so/5254f99a2e89437ca5a1834975ee1b31?v=b9efa409eb214a869d31a44c6fa658cd&pvs=4