RIBA scraps Plan of Work: say goodbye to stages A-L

Anthony Hoete, director, WHAT_architecture reports in the AJ: ‘While a re-alignment of the RIBA work stages maybe potentially worthwhile, in terms of foreign joint venture workability, a pan-European alignment of work stages that equilibrates the RIBA work stages with the HOIA (in Germany) with the French Loi MOP would be of more value.’

A sign that architecture continues to function at some distance from popular society is evident in our mailbag. WHAT_architecture has been variously written WHAT_architetexture, arty texture, artichoke…

The history of the underground makes us think that the history of Shoreditch Underground Station is one of balancing mobility, housing and infrastructure. Could the architecture of the railway arches be used to support housing: sustainable conservation is in the balance. A re-think is always useful.

Moving house? WHAT_architecture presents its preliminary design for the first Red Bull London Grand Prix…

Minecraft is an open world (non-linear) game that has no specific goals for the player to accomplish, allowing players a large amount of freedom in choosing how to play the game. The core gameplay revolves around breaking and placing blocks. The game world is essentially composed of rough 3D objects—mainly cubes—that are arranged in a fixed grid pattern and represent different materials, such as dirt, stone, various ores, water, and tree trunks. While players can move freely across the world, objects and items can only be placed at fixed locations relative to the grid. Players can gather these material blocks and place them elsewhere, thus allowing for various constructions. Such is the popularity of Minecraft that it has spawned gameplay music and the channel Yogscasts: (thanks to Maui!)

Le Corbusier talked about the free plan; WHAT_architecture talks about the free lunch thanks to our weekly `sushi CPDs`:

SHOOTING MODEL STILLS:

Using Tungsten Light Setting for 7D White Balance (WB button)

1. set camera to manual M
2. set to stills
3. go to WB button, push and change setting to TUNGSTEN LIGHT (light bulb)
4. set QUALITY: S RAW = 8Mb for example
5. set JPEG: high powered SMALL or MEDIUM
6. set sensitivity say 800 standard, with lots of light (artificial)
7. shoot at 1/200 sec approx hand held against desired depth of field and check exposure balance if zero
8. set motor drive High Burst to take multiple frames say 2-3 photos
9. 50mm good lens

10. use tripod ideal for architectural models

Get shooting! Don’t kill anyone or break anything.

SHOOTING EXIT INTERVIEW MOVIES:

1. Sort out the sound: use a lapel mic (if you cannot hear anything no one will watch or listen: think Radio with Pictures: its radio with some imagery
2. Work between 100-800 ISO
3. Auto Focus on a tripod
4. Can plug laptop into camera (Camera Utilities software): good for time lapse
5. Optimise for viewing experience: web 800 x 600?

Get shooting! Make someone famous! © WHAT_architecture 2013.

DRAFT!!

In 1922, one of the possible fathers of modern architecture, Le Corbusier, wrote ‘Architecture ou Révolution: ‘It is the question of building which lies at the root of the social unrest of today; architecture or revolution.’

Today, 2013, the question has become WHAT_architecture or resolution!? The society we are today trying to build is one built on image. Buildings as brand: brand building. Nothing new here (Mazda car park by NL Architects, Adidas HQ by Neutelings Reidijk…) but the supplied image is one of increasing resolution. Today your phone can take a better photograph than your camera, 8Mb pixelations of life, then 15Mb…). The image as projected by advertising, architecture and presented in competitions require immense resolutional demands 300dpi… I saw a 1GB photoshop file on the server …’8-bit’ attitudes whereby….

A compulsory purchase order is a legal function (CPO in the United Kingdom) that allows certain bodies which need to obtain land or property to do so without the consent of the owner. It may be enforced if a proposed development is considered one for public betterment – for example – when building motorways where a land owner does not want to sell. An elderly couple in the Chinese province of Zhejiang refused to sign an agreement to allow their house to be demolished. They say that compensation offered is not enough to cover rebuilding costs. As a result their house sits awkwardly in the middle of a newly built road in Wenling.