Week 2 Things

1) I have looked at all the blogs that I have on my blogroll so far. I'm not going to comment on them individually, except to say that you have noted an interesting range of buildings - from an anonymous timber hiking shelter, to Petra's carved-out treasury, to something by Calatrava (I think if I had done this exercise I would also have used a Calatrava building). There's also quite a variety of skills in the group - 3D CAD, manual drawing, carpentry etc. It looks like most of you are not new to design of some kind or another.

2) Your blogs should contain the exercises set in lectures, but these can be interspersed with any other things you stumble on and find interesting....text, images, videos, random musings. It's a way for you to broadcast your thoughts and get feedback, and to see the ideas that are occupying other people. If you are inspired by another student's work, by all means put it on your blog (with their permission). On this note:

3) A few of you aren't referencing yet. At the moment it looks like inexperience or laziness, but eventually it can lead to your academic integrity being questioned. Get into good habits now. There are many conventions for how to reference. For now, if you're referencing a website, at least put up the web address and the day you accessed it (if the website doesn't actually credit the photographer or author of the bit of work you're pinching).

4) I take it from the fact that none of you have posted any sketches for me to look at that you're all clear on which sections you're developing for next week. I hope you're not choosing the easy and straightforward ones, but ones that will challenge you. If you look at them now, you shouldn't necessarily have any idea of how you will go about modelling them when you hit SketchUp. It's ok to let them evolve.

5) If you have time, go and see the Olafur Eliasson exhibition at the MCA and play with lego. He does some cool things with planes and shapes, and inserting cold / wet / dark / reflective environments into a very conventional exhibition space. (He also did the quirky loop staircase in front of the bank in Germany that was on one of Russell's lecture slides today).

6) Monika is your student rep. Go to her with ideas for the end of session party. Also any comments about the course or the tutorial if you don't want to come to me.

7) If you are 'following' me, it doesn't always mean that I can see your blog. Please keep giving me your blog addresses, I have a little over half of them now.