Chen Yue & Matthew – Week 11

One of the biggest concerns for our installation is how the whole system operates and how to ensure safety of the passengers . We came up with the concept of locking the boat in place at the platform when passengers are embarking and disembarking by stopping the pulley system. There are two buttons used, one on the platform and another on the side of the boat. These info-graphics show how it works.

  

 

 

Below are some renderings after added design and modification.

Lastly, we placed the installation on the screenshot of the map of Nanyang Lake. To make the trip more interesting and provide passengers more view of the surrounding, we decided to create a slightly longer distance (70 meters).

Besides, we are also considering on which design to adopt to make the gate/entrance to the pedal boat more visible.

Chen Yue & Matthew – Week 9

 

After consultation and discussion, we decided to focus on refining our boat design. We wanted to make the design more unique and site-specific to the lake, instead of one that is commonly seen elsewhere.

Concept Sketch

 

Inspiration & Concept
 The main objective of this project wasn't to put a recreational boat on the lake, but rather, to rediscover the Nantah spirit through an experience of team work, effort and communication.

The installation acts as a connection between the passengers and the story in the past and is also an iconic symbol that only fits the selected location. Therefore, we want to proceed the concept of two pedal boats on a pulley system as it conveys the message well across.

As mentioned before, we intended to create a mechanical-feel to the boat as it ties in more with the context of being placed in a technological university. And referring back to the story of the Nanyang lake, we sought inspiration from the heavy machine:  Excavator

An excavator is used for digging. It has a great significance to the site as the Nanyang Lake was first build using manual labor from students and faculties. Now as technology advances, it shows how technological advancement has progress and made things easier for mankind. It depicts us as a technological university which is research intensive and always innovating breakthroughs to benefit the society. We would like to use the shape of the excavator to pay tribute to those who manually dug up the lake but with a modern twist.

 

Concept Design
   

The boat will be constructed on an existing compact pedal boat. The design resembles distinct features of an excavator with its iconic yellow & black color as well as conveyor belts. The light design follows the one of the excavator and plays an important role for communication.

Dimensions & Specifications
 

Plastics can be considered as the material for the outer casing of the pedal boat. It has a high strength-weight ratio and also very resistant to weather. Plastics are lightweight and moisture resistant, which are good properties for making a boat. Some of these plastics include ABS, HDPE, LDPE and PP.

These plastic sheets can be easily moulded and fabricated into our desired exterior shape using CNC machining. Industries provide a full range of plastic products from tubes, rods and sheets.

 

Interaction & Communication

There will be a push switch inside each pedal boat that allows user to notify each other. Below are some possible scenarios. The two boats are connected with cable on a pulley system and therefore, their movement affect each other.

 (1) Green light meaning both boats want to continue pedaling and move along with the pulley
  (2) Red light indicating disembarking at the next platform, and the other responds with green light, willing to help pedal along
 (3) Both boat disembarking at the next platform
 (4) No respond from the other boat, only passengers on the disembarking boat pedal and they move at a slower speed

Chen Yue & Matthew – Week 5

Based on the concept of Nantah spirit of team work and feedback from last week’s presentation, we went on to explore more about the space, especially focusing on the essential element, the Nanyang Lake.

The photo below provides a clearer view of the lake and surroundings:

The narrow pathway embracing the lake, and the benches are all exposed to the scorching sunlight during the day. At night time the place is dark and quite. Despite the peaceful and nice natural environment, people seldom visit the place.

Our concepts will incorporate the element of play and team spirit to create an installation that is site-specific and provide an attraction for people.

Inspiration – Water Game

There are various types of water games where people cooperate and play. Most of these installations are made of inflatable materials and require high level of sport involvement. Among all these, the concept of a water roller and pedal boats seems pretty interesting.

Inspiration – Bridge

Bridges would also fit nicely as suggested in last week’s class. There are many fascinating bridge designs that inspire our design as well.

https://www.archdaily.com/543458/friedrich-bayer-bridge-loebcapote-arquitetura-e-urbanismo

This is a bridge with two halves that rotate to join or separate. The design allows canal navigability. Below it’s a kinetic bridge with the similar purpose. The design is iconic and dramatic.

https://mymodernmet.com/knight-architects-akt-ii-merchant-square-footbridge/

http://www.mostamazingplaces.net/some-unusual-bridges-in-the-world/

Unlike many bridges that broke into two, this bridge is unique in the way that it closed itself up into one piece.

 

Concept 1

The design is a shelter with seats and pedals of two directions installed.With the fixed track in the water, the shelter allows people to sit under it and step on the pedals/ cycle. The whole shelter will then move towards the direction. More people stepping, it will move faster.  They can use it like a bridge to cross the lake, or just seat and relax in the middle.

At night, the shelter will be lit up using power generated from the solar panel installed on top of it, providing a nice reflection on the water.

 

Concept 2

This concept is just slightly different from the previous one. Instead of moving in a straight manner, there are two shelters attached at two ends of the installation. The shelters will then rotate around the centre and transporting people to cross the lake.

 

 

 

Chen Yue & Matthew – Week 1

The article The Infra-Ordinary ” by Georges Perec raised  many questions on the ordinary and mundane things that happen almost everywhere everyday. We are so familiar with them that we stop noticing. Perec encouraged people to ask questions about daily things and challenge the ordinary. It’s only when we think about it that we realize how little we actually know and how much information is just being neglected by us.

With this realization, we started to think about our daily life in NTU and began to obtain more observation. During our discussion, this photo below that caught our attention.

It was the icon of NTU pioneer hall on the wall as shown in this photo. It resembled a bone icon but actually it derived from the top view of the Pioneer hall cluster.

It was quite shocking to find out this interesting fact about pioneer hall. Even though we rely highly on our sight to navigate around places, there were still many things that we overlooked.

We decided to create a sculpture to describe many mundane details of this place.  An experience of the pioneer hall was composed of not just the visual but many other senses. According to this article (https://velvetchainsaw.com/2012/05/23/your-senses-your-raw-information-learning-portals/), the percentage of senses we reply were as followed:

83.0% – Sight
11.0% – Hearing
03.5% – Smell
01.5% – Touch
01.0% – Taste

For this experience sculpture, there were three blocks, in the shape of the building icon. With varying heights, each represented the following senses: hearing, smell and touch. The tallest one contained dry tree leaves to create the sound of tree branches. The following had a smell of coffee, representing the canteen experience and lastly, the lowest one provided touch that simulated the texture of the walls in the pioneer hall.