Recherche théorique

Paysages érodés comme générateurs de la forme architecturale | une approche basée sur l’adaptabilité environnementale.
Adaptive Architecture | Experiencing Visual and Thermal Delight in Architecture
The Creative Eye | a digital process exploring visual and thermal diversity in architecture
Environmental Adaptability in Architecture

Paysages érodés comme générateurs de la forme architecturale | une approche basée sur l’adaptabilité environnementale.

Subvention de recherche-création. Fonds de recherche du Québec – Société et Culture.(2013-2017)

« Paysages Érodés » propose d’étudier les morphologies présentes dans les paysages naturels, résultats de transformations causées par des phénomènes atmosphériques tels que le soleil, le vent, la neige et la pluie. Ces formes naturelles établissent le corpus de la recherche et en constitue l’inspiration dans une démarche de création architecturale sensible écologiquement. Le projet permet de poser un regard critique sur ce corpus omniprésent dans l’environnement et de mettre en valeur son potentiel générateur de formes architecturales adaptées à un contexte nordique. Les accumulations nivales par exemple, un phénomène récurrent en hiver au Québec, sont formées localement sous l’action de « poudrerie ». Elles se transforment continuellement en formes organiques autour d’obstacles et incarnent physiquement l’ombre du vent. Subséquemment exposées au soleil, au vent et à la pluie, ces congères s’adaptent lentement pour exprimer les conditions climatiques inhérentes à un lieu. Architecturalement, la résultante de ces forces suggère des morphologies procurant des hypothèses de design qui stimulent une réflexion sur la manière d’habiter, fournissent un vocabulaire adapté au contexte local et apportent de nouvelles opportunités environnementales. La dynamique cyclique de l’environnement naturel en termes de matière et d’énergie pourrait donc constituer une source d’inspiration qui favorise la redécouverte d’un sens du lieu (genius loci) tout en créant des solutions de conception originales et fonctionnelles stimulant les sens et favorisant des formes construites adaptées à l’environnement. Paysages Érodés contribue au renouveau de l’architecture en utilisant les images numériques comme point de départ du processus de conception afin de réinvestir notre expérience de l’espace avec de riches stimuli visuels et thermiques. La méthode d’analyse basée sur l’analyse digitale d’images thermiques et lumineuses du paysage érodé constitue un moyen intégré unique pour représenter la dynamique de transformation des formes naturelles. Une technique analogique d’érosion des sables fins dans l’eau permet de spéculer sur de nouvelles morphologies. La validation des hypothèses s’effectue par la construction, laquelle exige une complexité accrue des connaissances, notamment techniques, sans pour autant négliger l’existence d’une source d’inspiration intuitive. La contribution à la connaissance de la théorie architecturale et de conception se concrétise dans une bibliothèque combinée d’images basée sur des enquêtes In Situ et des explorations spéculatives. Les images numériques utilisés au stade de la spéculation d’une composition qui reste plutôt suggestive, se développeront à l’étape de validation constructive à travers l’analyse du modèle physique. En réinvestissant le processus de conception avec une expérience combinée de maquettes analogiques et des outils de simulation, cette proposition suggère que les manipulations tactiles de géométries complexes demeurent plus rapide à réaliser que tout autre type de simulation. Pour de nombreux architectes, la libération de la machine libère également l’imagination dans les stades précoces de la conception et encourage les découvertes inattendues qui peuvent encore être évaluées en utilisant la simulation numérique. Loin de nier la valeur des outils numériques, cette recherche les réinvestit avec de nouvelles données générées par la nature non déterministe du paysage érodé vu à travers des maquettes à grande échelle. »

C Demers et A Potvin

Chaire industrielle de recherche sur la construction écoresponsable en bois (2013-2018)

Ce projet de recherche multidisciplinaire regroupe 20 chercheurs issus des domaines de l’architecture, du génie civil et du génie mécanique. Il vise à développer de nouvelles connaissances et approches méthodologiques visant à promouvoir l’usage du bois dans la construction. Le candidat est responsable du volet ‘Conception intégrée’ au sein de ce regroupement de chercheur et travaille actuellement avec des collègues ingénieurs et de nombreux étudiants gradués à des projets d’intégration. Les projets de finissants de l’École d’architecture permettront aussi d’illustrer des nouveaux assemblages et procédés développés à l’intérieur de la programmation de recherche de la Chaire.

https://circerb.chaire.ulaval.ca/

Groupe de recherche international (GDRI) Ambiances en traduction (2013-2018)

Ce Groupement de Recherche International du CNRS (GDRI) a été créé à l’initiative du Réseau International Ambiances et propose d’explorer la problématique des ambiances en traduction. Le mot «traduction» doit être compris ici au sens large du terme, non réduit à une dénotation strictement linguistique, même si ce plan est bien évidemment présent et partie constitutive du projet. En mettant l’accent sur la traduction, il s’agit à la fois de reconnaître la pluralité des versions et modes d’accès aux ambiances, de mettre au travail la notion d’ambiance en l’inscrivant dans un dispositif collaboratif, et d’approcher la thématique des ambiances architecturales et urbaines en s’intéressant aux écarts et déplacements qu’elle convoque. Mais encore, en thématisant l’ambiance en termes de traduction, nous affirmons un triple positionnement :

-Nous nous situons au croisement des mondes scientifiques, opérationnels et artistiques. Les traductions qui seront entreprises dans le projet s’appuieront sur les acquis de savoirs, méthodes et ressources issus de ces trois mondes.

-La posture générale adoptée peut être définie de pragmatiste. C’est au moyen d’expérimentations que nous souhaitons travailler sur les ambiances, en nous intéressant aux effets produits, conséquences et circulations d’une telle notion.

-La problématique de la traduction fonctionne à la fois comme une entrée dans la thématique des ambiances et comme un principe du travail collaboratif à entreprendre. Le dispositif méthodologique retenu consistera précisément à se « mettre en traduction ».

Cette entrée par la « traduction » peut être déclinée selon quatre plans :

-Traduction linguistique : clarification de la notion d’ambiance (Séminaire Nantes 2014)

-Traduction disciplinaire : exploration de passerelles scientifiques (Séminaire Montréal 2015. Organisé par C Demers et M Coté)

-Traduction sensorielle : expérimentation d’expressions multimodales (Séminaire Volos 2016)

-Traduction professionnelle : prospection de modes opératoires

http://www.ambiances.net/seminars/gdri-translating-ambiances.html

Adaptive Architecture | Experiencing Visual and Thermal Delight in Architecture

Research Grant, CRSH-SSHRC

Adaptive Architecture explores the environmental diversity stemming from the combination of visual and thermal perception of light through an innovative digital design and analysis process developed by Demers [1993-2007]. Building on previous theoretical transitional typologies defined by Potvin [2002], the research-creation program will first identify and analyze real transitional structures favoring adaptive opportunities such as minimalist vernacular architecture in order to help feed the speculative design process in a full-scale adaptable mock-up. Adaptable Architecture will explore the potential to expand the notion of comfort and delight (pleasantness) in an outdoor semi-protected and modifiable structure that will consist of a refuge. The research creation project proposes to design, build, occupy and evaluate a simple but yet highly modifiable refuge, a semi-protected structure that will allow parametric analysis of several typologies of spatial transformations according to diurnal and seasonal climate diversity. The notion of adaptability will be studied qualitatively and quantitatively in relation to the notion of environmental delight first introduced by Heschong [1979] throughout the architectural design process. The design and occupation of this Adaptive Architecture will enable explorations of adaptive opportunities in real time in an outdoor space, at human scale.

Claude MH Demers + André Potvin

Context of Implementation

Adaptable Architecture will explore the potential to expand the notion of comfort and delight (pleasantness) in an outdoor semi-protected and modifiable structure that will consist of a refuge. The research creation project proposes to design, build, occupy and evaluate a simple but yet highly modifiable refuge, a semi-protected structure that will allow parametric analysis of several typologies of spatial transformations according to diurnal and seasonal climate diversity. The notion of adaptability will be studied qualitatively and quantitatively in relation to the notion of environmental delight first introduced by Heschong [1979] throughout the architectural design process. The design and occupation of this Adaptive Architecture will enable explorations of adaptive opportunities in real time in an outdoor space, at human scale. It will emerge from the study of architectural precedents such as vernacular architecture, results from Demers’s research-creation grant on Nordic Light in Architecture [Demers, 1999], Potvin’s CALQ research-creation grant on Transitions in Architecture [Potvin, 2002] and a recent FQRSC research-creation grant entitled “The Creative Eye” [Demers, Potvin, 2008]. Such environmental explorations also occurred in recent graduate students’ thesis [Biron, 2008; Bontemps, 2007; Dubois, 2006] supervised by the research team. Those researches have all pointed out to the high complexity of integrating simultaneously the visual and thermal qualities of light in the design process since thermal aspects are scale dependent whereas visual aspects are independent from scale. Adaptive Architecture will enable the full-scale exploration of the combined visual and thermal qualities of light stemming from diurnal and seasonal climatic diversity. An integrated design process demands that a clear representation of the invisible thermal aspect of light be more important in the decision making process, which will be explored using a series of digital media tools such as video and thermal cameras. The adequate representation of design intentions in environmental design should be at the forefront of creative thinking in architecture. Architecture (design and construction) demands an increased complexity of knowledge, especially technical, but this should by no means imply the non-existence of any intuitive inspiration. Images (thermal and visual) will be used at the speculative stage of composition, which remains rather suggestive, and develop at the constructive stage through extensive analysis. These two complementary aspects, will be combined at real scale using a design methodology based on image analysis and tactile manipulations developed by Demers [1993, 1997, 2003, 2007] using digital and analogical (drawings and scale models) techniques. Adaptable Architecture proposes to contribute to the renewal of architecture by using digital media and tools as starting points of the design process to reinvest our experience of space with rich visual and thermal stimuli instead of the current mono functionality derived from the deterministic approach to environmental science.

Objectives

Contribution to the theory and practice of environmental diversity in architecture through the study of adaptive opportunities;
Demonstration of the creative and interactive design potential stemming from the combined visual and thermal aspects of light;
Development of the existing methodology for assessing dynamic environmental adaptability;
Expansion of the transitional spaces typologies by studying climate responsive precedents;
Integration of thermal imaging technology to the digital method of image analysis developed by the research team; and
Validation of the potential for speculative transitional typologies based on empirical knowledge, qualitative and quantitative analysis of design hypothesis, and full scale mock-up.

This research proposes an original mean of assessing visual and thermal ambiences that enables architects to develop a more integrated approach to environmental design, and in some respect encourages them to go beyond the mere quantitative aspects of light. The digital image methodology favours a convivial relation between the architect and light building on the graphically driven intuitive thinking of designers. Although visual representation of light has always been at the centre of the architectural design process and theory, the representation of its thermal properties has seldom been explored during the design process. Recent development in infrared thermal imagery now offers an opportunity to open up the invisible thermal aspect of space to architects.

The Canadian climate offers critical lighting design conditions both in terms of its thermal and visual aspects. Extreme diurnal and seasonal variations are unique to Nordic cultures. This diversity should stimulate architectural complexity rather than oversimplify it with deterministic principles negating adaptability of occupants and buildings. Contextual opportunities are not only possible, but should constitute the basis for the rediscovery of our common sense of place and belonging. Seasonal Canadian climatic diversity is inclusive of worldwide five major climate systems ranging from cold-arid to hot-humid that witnessed the development of several cultures. Adaptive Architecture will gather and integrate the diverse climatic solutions of these cultures into a common hybrid object reflecting Canadian openness and adaptability to new paradigms. Several authors have tried in the past to identify the true Canadian architectural language. Adaptive Architecture should therefore demonstrate that Canadian architectural language, when acknowledging climate and cultural diversity, is fundamentally hybrid.

On Environmental Adaptation

Upstream from the design process resides nature, the basis element that is omnipresent in any architectural project. As expressive means between individuals and nature expand, landscape becomes more meaningful and greater becomes the possibility of cultural and poetical reinterpretation of this landscape. The cyclic dynamics of the natural environment in terms of matter and energy should therefore constitutes a source of inspiration that favors the rediscovery of a sense of place (genius loci) while creating original and functional design solutions stimulating the senses and fostering adaptive opportunities. Research in architecture and related building sciences have recently shifted from compartmented deterministic disciplines towards a more systemic approach (qualitative and quantitative) integrating all aspects of perception and comfort. This approach demands a higher level of understanding of the diversity and variability of environmental stimuli and the way people and buildings adapt to those stimuli. For architects, environmental diversity and adaptability represents a unique way to explore the rich potential for interior-exterior transitions according to climate variations. Transitional spaces, which are neither internal nor external, have the power to generate more refined articulations between interior and exterior and favour visual and thermal adaptations of both individual and built form to the variability of the environment [Potvin, 2004]. Recent developments in energy simulation modelling have significantly contributed to the quantitative evaluation of daylighting and passive solar strategies and yet, very few researchers have explored the combined visual and thermal qualitative aspects of light. This lack of visual and thermal literacy often leads to major incompatibility in terms of environmental comfort and deceiving energy performance. The integration of the visual and thermal qualities of light in buildings are fundamental and should be part of the architect’s basic skills in the creation of responsive environmental design.

Results

Adaptive Architecture will result in a dynamic representation of 365 days of environmental delight both visual and thermal. This adaptive history between occupants and the prototype will express the potential of adaptability to enhance the experience of architecture according to changing environmental conditions. On-line media rendering using high definition images of the visible lighting chiaroscuro and the invisible thermal qualities of radiant and surface temperatures will accompany the seasonal timeline to provide readers a clear dynamic qualitative and quantitative assessment of spatial and environmental qualities of Adaptive Architecture. Web cams will be linked to the web-site of the Adaptive Architecture as a live diary of the structure. A book resuming the entire research-creation process will be published by Les presses de l’Université Laval, both on-line and hard copies.

References

ADOLPHE, Luc, (1998), Ambiances architecturales et urbaines, Editions Parenthèses, Paris.

BAKER, Nick, Koen STEEMERS, (2002), Daylight design of buildings, James & James, London.

BIRON, Karole, (2008), Dynamique forme/lumière: Exploration du processus de création de l’espace architectural par modèles maquettes/images, thèse de maîtrise en architecture (M.Sc.), École d’architecture, Université Laval, Canada.

BONTEMPS, Arnaud, (2007), Représentation dynamique des ambiances physiques dans une approche filmique, thèse de maîtrise en architecture (M.Sc.), École d’architecture, Université Laval, Canada.

CELIS-MERCIER, S., POTVIN A., DEMERS, C MH, (2008), « The Pleasant Temperature: Window Manipulation and Dynamics of Thermal Comfort in a Naturally Conditionned Space, PLEA 2008- 25th Conference on Passive and Low Energy Architecture, Dublin, 22nd to 24th October 2008.

DEMERS, C., (2007), « The Creative Eye: A tactile and digital process of imagining and building lights in architecture », in « Fresh air », Proceedings of the 2007 Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) 95th Annual Meeting in Philadelphia, 8-11 March. Paper selected from the ACSA 2006 Northeastern Conference.

DEMERS, C., POTVIN, A., (2007), Daylighting anf thermal strategies in the design process: case study of Laval University’s new medical faculty building, in the Conference Proceedings of the American Solar Energy Society (ASES), SOLAR 2007, 7-12 July, Cleaveland, Ohio.

DEMERS, C, (2007), « A Classification of daylighting qualitites based on contrast and brightness analysis », in the Conference Proceedings of the American Solar Energy Society (ASES), SOLAR 2007, 7-12 July, Cleaveland, Ohio.

DEMERS, C., (2006), “Assessing light in architecture: A numerical procedure for a qualitative and quantitative analysis”, dans les actes de colloque de , l’Italian Lighting Association (AIDI), Commission Internationale de l’Éclairage (CIE), Venise, 9-10 octobre 2006.

DEMERS, POTVIN, (2004), “Physical ambiences in architecture : towards a multi-sensory approach to sustainability”, Department of Architecture, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK, 5 mai

DEMERS, C., POTVIN, A. (2004), « LUMcalcul 2.01: prédiction de la lumière naturelle pour la conception architecturale », Proceedings of eSIM2004, Vancouver 9 -11 juin 2004.

DEMERS, C., (2001), Disponibilité de la lumière naturelle à Québec, Rapport de recherche, École d’architecture, Université Laval.

DEMERS, C., (2000), “Light and the digital image : a proposed framework for design and analysis” dans Architecture City Environment, Proceedings of PLEA 2000, July 2000, Cambridge, United Kingdom. Éditeurs : Koen Steemers and Simos Yannas. James and James Science Publishers, London, 2000.

DEMERS, (1997), “The Sanctuary of Art : images in the design and assessment of light in architecture”, The Martin Centre for Architectural and Urban Studies, University of Cambridge, UK.

DEMERS, C, (1993), « L’influence du design des ouvertures sur le contraste d’intensité dans les espaces intérieurs éclairés naturellement », thèse de maîtrise, École d’architecture, Université Laval, Québec, Canada.

DUBOIS, Catherine, (2006), Confort et diversité des ambiances lumineuses en architecture : l’influence de la lumière naturelle sur les occupants, , thèse de maîtrise en architecture (M.Sc.), École d’architecture, Université Laval, Canada.

EVANS, Ralph M., (1959), Eye, film, and camera in color photography, New York, John Wiley and Sons, Inc. HAWKES, Dean, U, (2007), The Environmental Imagination, Spon Press, London.

HAWKES, Dean, U, (1995), The Environmental Tradition: Studies in the Architecture of the Environment, Spon Press, London. HAWKES, Dean U., (1976), “Types, norms and habits in environmental design” in March, Lionel, The architecture of form, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 465-481. (Also in “The Environmental Tradition”).

HESCHONG, Lisa, (1979), Thermal delight in architecture, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. Le CORBUSIER, (1923), Towards a new architecture, translated by Frederick Etchells, London, Butterworh Architecture, reprinted in 1989. POTVIN, A.,

BONTEMPS, A., DEMERS, C. (2007), “The Dynamics of Physical Ambiences, Development of a Representation Technique Through a Filmic and Sensory Approach”, ACADIA2007 Conference-Expanding Bodies, Halifax, 1-7 octobre 2007.

POTVIN, A. (2004), “Chapitre 5 : Intermediate Environments”, in Environmental Diversity in Architecture, Koen Steemers Ed., E&F Spon Press, London.

POTVIN, DEMERS, DUBOIS, (2004), “Environmental Adaptability in architecture: towards a dynamic multi-sensory approach integrating user’s behaviour”, Proceedings of Windsor2004, Windsor Conference on POEs, 29 avril-2 mai 2004: Closing the loop : Post-occupancy evaluation.

POTVIN, A., DEMERS, C., BOIVIN, H. (2004), PETv4.2 Les profils d’équilibre thermique comme outil d’aide à la conception architecturale, Proceedings of eSIM2004, Vancouver 9 -11 juin 2004.

POTVIN, A. (2002) “L’intérieur-extérieur”, Exposition publique des résultats d’une bourse aux artistes professionnels du CALQ (Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec), École d’architecture, 21 mars-11 avril 2002.

POTVIN, A. (2002), ”A Combined Quantitative and Qualitative Approch to Comfort”, dans les Actes de PLEA2002 (Passive Low-Energy Architecture, Toulouse, Juillet 2002.

The Creative Eye | a digital process exploring visual and thermal diversity in architecture

Research Grant, FQRSC (Fonds Québécois pour la recherche sur la société et la culture)

This research proposes to explore the environmental diversity stemming from the combination of visual and thermal perception of light through a digital design process. Starting from previous theoretical transitional typologies defined by Potvin [1999], the research will first identifies existing structures corresponding to these basic typologies to feed the creative design process. The library of images will consist of typologies that will play “a creative role by allowing the designer to begin the cycle of analysis and revision from a reasonably confident position” [Hawkes, 1976] to develop space and light explorations. The videosketchbook approach, a digital design methodology developed by Demers [1997, 2003, 2006] for lighting design will be expanded to encompass thermal imagery and used as a design tool throughout the research program.

Claude MH Demers and André Potvin

Context of implementation of the research-creation program

Today’s sustainable challenge in architecture greatly depends upon the architects’ ability to optimise the energy performance of buildings. This energy performance rests fundamentally on two aspects: the correct definition of the interior-exterior transition in terms of opacity and transparency and the comfort expectation of the occupants. Transitional spaces, which are neither inside nor outside, could therefore optimize the free energy transactions of light, heat, and air between the exterior ambient environment and the interior while increasing the occupants’ adaptation through environmental diversity. Recent developments in energy simulation modelling have significantly contributed to the quantitative evaluation of daylighting and solar strategies and yet, very few researchers have explored the combined visual and thermal qualitative aspects of light. This lack of visual and thermal literacy often leads to major incompatibility in terms of environmental comfort and deceiving energy performance. The integration of the visual and thermal qualities of light in buildings are fundamental and should be part of the architect’s basic skills in the creation of responsive environmental design.

Architects are already taking advantage of the recent development of digital technology but they still tend to rely mainly on post-design simulation of their project for validation purposes. Digital technology should rather be integrated throughout the design process to encourage the qualitative creative inquiry. Digital imagery, with its inherent qualitative perceptual values and its quantitative pixelated content offer an integrated medium for the study of physical ambiences in in situ analysis or more speculative explorations through scale models.

This research will explore the environmental diversity stemming from the combination of visual and thermal perception of light through a digital design process. Starting from previous theoretical transitional typologies defined by Potvin [1999], the research will first identify existing structures corresponding to these basic typologies to feed the creative design process. The library of images will consist of typologies that will play ‘a creative role by allowing the designer to begin the cycle of analysis and revision from a reasonably confident position’ [Hawkes, 1976] in the development of space and light explorations. The videosketchbook approach, a digital design methodology developed by Demers [1997, 2003, 2006] for lighting design will be expanded to encompass thermal imagery and used as a design tool throughout the research program.

Objectives pursued by research-creation approach

General

Development of the theory and practice of environmental diversity in architecture
Creation of a typology of lighting and thermal ambiences based on a visualisation approach that integrates visual and tactile experiences
Initiation of a creative and interactive design process between the qualitative and quantitative aspects of lighting and thermal aspects of architecture using a digital method of image analysis

Specific

Integration of thermal imaging technology to the digital method of image analysis developed by Demers [1991-2007] for the visualisation of light in architecture
Association of typologies of transitional spaces developed by Potvin [1999] with analysed architectural precedents to integrate a discussion of lighting and thermal ambiences
Exploration of the potential of transitional typologies based on an empirical knowledge built from the design method using a tactile and digital process of imagining architectural spaces

Demonstration of the originality of the research-creation program

This research proposes an original mean of assessing visual and thermal ambiences that enables architects to develop a more integrated approach to environmental design, and in some respect encourages them to go beyond the mere quantitative aspects of light. The digital image methodology favours a convivial relation between the architect and light by introducing a technique that develops an intuitive thinking and a combined visual and thermal approach to light. Although visual representation of light has always been at the centre of the architectural design process and theory, the representation of its thermal properties has seldom been explored during the design process. Recent development in infrared thermal imagery now offers an opportunity to open up the invisible thermal aspect of space to architects.

An image consists of an abstraction of reality, but its realistic and convincing character propels the design activities to higher levels of interpretations. The image constitutes a stimulating design tool because of its capacity to represent the immaterial qualities of light. In the context of architecture, photography becomes partly a scientific quantitative basis, partly a qualitative recording of lighting patterns. Interestingly, a photograph may promise reality, truth, and scientific precision, but it also belongs to art as it often holds magic and mystery, contributing to inspire architects in the creative process. The eye of the architect therefore becomes more intimately linked to a certain reality of lighting composition as it is rigorously trained in relation to existing theories of physical ambiences. An image, when properly exposed, is ‘a direct record of the amounts of light to which each area has been exposed’ [Evans, 1959]. The image therefore constitutes the basis of the following method of acquiring visual and thermal data in architecture. Imagery analysis uses digital and thermal cameras to graphically represent visual and thermal patterns of light according to a unique methodology for the assessment of architectural precedents and speculative exploration.

Contrast as a global integrator of qualitative and quantitative variables of light is an innovative aspect of this research that has been previously correlated with photocell measurements by Demers [1997, 2006]. Contrast can equally be used for space perception and aesthetics studies or for illumination levels studies. Digital image analysis can therefore provide fundamental quantitative and qualitative assessments of light in space. Quantitatively, the image represents more than its usual attributes. The familiarity of the image to most designers eventually encourages a more global comprehension of the luminous environment. The designer progressively gains more confidence about the visualization of light and ultimately becomes less dependent upon the tool as the sum of acquired knowledge [Le Corbusier, 1923] increases. In that respect, the pedagogic significance of the method cannot be underestimated. The combined utilization of physical modeling and computerized image analysis promotes the complementary tactile and experimental approaches to design. It provides a simplified design tool of analysis for precedents analysis, early design stages as well as for further development of a project.

Finally, this research proposes to build an original library of images through the analysis of in situ and speculative building typologies to improve the architect’s light literacy. Such a library of digital photographs has the potential to revive past memories of lighting experiences and stimulate the design process. Demers [2006] has demonstrated the potential of images to generate quantitative and qualitative data as well as offering a basis for interactively adding images one to another in a series of digital experimentations. From the confidence of the precedents stored in the library of images, the architect would then develop a genuine Creative Eye through the simultaneous manipulation of digital images and physical models.

The approach and the implementation stages of the research-creation program

The image-oriented approach developed by Demers [1997] over the last ten years constitutes the corner stone of the proposed research. Benefits of using such a method reside in its readily availability to all practitioners and students at a very low cost and ease of interpretation. Interest in the methodology involving the digital process of image analysis has also been shown in other researches by Siret [1997], Schiler [2002] and Bracarensi et. al. [2002]. The term image hereby refers to a photograph of a real artefact, whether an existing space or a scale model, gathered with a camera or video camera. Such images initially provide a framework for suggesting ambiences, or more realistically, to represent the physical attributes of a space. The Creative Eye methodology proposes two interrelated approaches to the integration of images in the design process:

an in situ approach based on the visual and thermal analysis of architectural precedents; and
a speculative approach based on the simultaneous use of the video and scale models.

Figure 1 illustrates the Creative Eye approaches and the three implementation stages leading ultimately to digitally born design projects: typologies, analysis and library of images. Transitional typologies, previously developed by Potvin [1999] through a research-creation grant on space formation and deformation, constitute the departing core of the research (refer to Portfolio section A-Theory). They will define the corpus of experimentations of in situ and speculative approaches. These typologies provide a systematic and rigorous vocabulary of theoretical transitional spaces. The transitional typologies where originally defined to explore the environmental diversity stemming from the basic positioning of two fundamental architectural variables: the wall and the opening. As argued earlier, the correct positioning of those two elements provides the basis for environmental responsive design. By varying the position of the transparent and opaque elements (independence, proximity, adjacency, intersection, inclusion) and their modality of integration (equality, subordination), seven main categories of transitional typologies appear: the platonic cube, the open floor, the kiosk, the pavilion, the double-wall, the central atrium and the peripheral atrium. The visual and thermal qualities of these transitional typologies, will be explored through digital image analysis of architectural precedents and speculative spaces.

In situ approach

In Situ surveys of existing buildings sharing some spatial properties with the basic transitional typologies will provide a contextual dimension for the digital image analysis stage and the creation of a classification of images according to their visual and thermal qualities.

Most qualitative aspects of light are not measurable, but this research introduces the use of contrast as a global integrator. Contrast relates to quantitative aspects of light since it can be measured but it also relates to qualitative aspects since it constitutes an essential component of the perceptual description of an ambience. Contrast has always been an important descriptor of the quality of photographic images and is the most versatile variable that can establish a common basis for the qualitative and quantitative comparison between design solutions. This contrast-based method will be expanded to infrared imagery to seek a relationship between visual and thermal qualities of existing spaces leading ultimately to a combined visual and thermal classification of lights.

Quantitative analysis: The standard deviation and the interquantile range are particularly significant in the overall evaluation of contrast as they are indicative of the variance between highest and lowest brightness values. The histogram of analysis for the brightness distribution of the pixels of the image also provides additional quantitative information that is relevant for the classification of spaces within an in situ library of images. The library allows for a rapid objective comparison of a particular image within the corpus or a building’s light ambiences relative to other architectural precedents. Even though the library will first be developed according to Potvin’s typologies, it could be expanded to suit any design program or designer’s own interests. From this basic classification, qualitative analysis will provide the designer with more information to understand the perceptual quality of a given image.

Qualitative analysis: The conventional calculation of contrast consists in the comparison between luminance of an object and its background. This approach is rather limiting for the evaluation of an entire space, and therefore, this research will explore other means to evaluate contrast on an entire image. The lighting pattern obtained from the brightness separation of the pixel units of the image offers a morphological assessment of light in space. The number of levels in the pattern and the distance between the curves are indicative of contrast. The research proposes two physical descriptors of the lighting pattern: the gradation of light and the compactness of the pattern. These descriptors add a quantifiable aspect to the interpretation of the morphology of the pattern and constitute a relevant mean to generate new design hypothesis.

Speculative approach

A speculative exploration using the simultaneous use of the images and scale models will further expand the possibilities of the basic transitional typologies. The resulting images will be classified within a speculative library of images using the same quantitative and qualitative analysis methods presented for the in situ approach. (Refer to portfolio A-Theory for classification method)

The contribution to the knowledge of architectural theory and design process will materialise in a combined library of images based on in situ surveys and speculative explorations. The library of images will constitute a reliable starting point to initiate the videosketchbook design process developed by Demers [1997]. The initial library, gathered through the in situ surveys, consists of photographs that initially inspire the architect and allow him to sketch spaces with existing images of light. Whereas initial images constitute a basic resource for space creation, the combination of images generates numerous design possibilities. Inspired from the library of images, the manipulation of physical models under certain lighting and spatial configurations will adds further levels of complexity and realism to the concretization of new design explorations. This approach acknowledges that tactile manipulations are still quicker to accomplish than any other type of simulation. For many architects, liberation from the machine is also an important source of imagination and encourages unexpected discoveries that can accurately create complex modeling of lighting effects. The medium of photography, because of its technical possibilities, will therefore become part of an interactive process of retouching and photomontage. Digital videos will combine physical models and architectural precedents in collages that will expand the imagination of the architect in the design process. Editing a digital image with the computer facilitates and accelerates the process of alteration and transformation. The research will explore the visual capacity of multimedia technology to suggest and generate different lighting ambiences through computer manipulations such as collage, scaling, and duplication. This act of cutting or juxtaposing, which consists in the careful arrangement of photographs, constitutes an improved art form of the early-glued photographic compositions of the Dadaists.

The proposed design process will be validated through design competitions and graduate level design studios. Moreover, interuniversity on-line design ‘battles’, where rapid representation of design intents is quintessential, will serve as pilot tests for the videosketchbook methodology. (Portfolio C-Teaching)

Impact of the research-creation program on the development or renewal of architecture

The evidence of the indeterminacy of the research findings into human environmental comfort is paradoxical to the deterministic effect and emphasis of much of the building science on twentieth century architecture where ‘Form follows Function’ was charged with deterministic implications [Hawkes 1976]. Research in architecture and related building sciences have recently shifted from compartmented deterministic disciplines towards a more systemic approach (qualitative and quantitative) integrating all aspects of perception and comfort. This approach demands a higher level of understanding of the diversity and variability of environmental stimuli and the way people and buildings adapt to those stimuli. For architects, environmental diversity represents a unique way to explore the rich potential of interior-exterior transitions. Transitional spaces, which are neither internal nor external, have the power to generate more refined articulations between interior and exterior and favour visual and thermal adaptations of both individual and built form to the variability of the environment. Achieving environmental diversity should be part of the design process and increase its creative potential without impairing comfort. Whereas environmental determinism led to uniformity, environmental diversity could lead to a more diversified, flexible, and climate-responsive architecture.

Digital images have the power to represent this environmental diversity. In art, the composition of an image is closely linked to the creative process, with all meanings inferred, but within the spatial constructive framework of architecture, composition needs to preserve its structural realism to remain in the realm of the possible. Maholy-Nagy [1932] had foreseen the interdependence of this dialectic nature of images when he suggested that composition and construction are aspects of the same problem. He argued that composition constitutes the highest level of intellectual evaluation of elements in their relationships between each other, whereas construction must ideally be pre-determined at every point of its technical and intellectual relations. Construction therefore demands an increased complexity of knowledge, especially technical, but this should by no means imply the non-existence of any intuitive inspiration. Images can be used at the speculative stage of a composition, which remains rather suggestive, and develop at the constructive stage through extensive model analysis (see portfolio B-Practice, Roche d’Oëtre). These two aspects are complementary, but necessitate a new methodology stemming from image analysis and tactile manipulations.

The Creative Eye proposes to contribute to the renewal of architecture by using digital images as starting points of the design process in order to reinvest our experience of space with rich visual and thermal stimuli instead of the current mono functionality derived from the deterministic approach to environmental science.

References

Bracarense, Viana Junior, Da Silva Jota, Sad De Assis, (2002), “Public building lighting performance analysis”, PLEA 2002 (Passive Low Energy in Architecture): Design with the environment, Proceedings of the 19th International Conference, Toulouse, France, July, p. 821-825.

DEMERS, POTVIN, (2004), “Physical ambiences in architecture : towards a multi-sensory approach to sustainability”, Department of Architecture, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK, 5 mai

DEMERS, (1997), “The Sanctuary of art : images in the design and assessment of light in architecture”, The Martin Centre for Architectural and Urban Studies, University of Cambridge, UK.

HAWKES, Dean U., (1976), “Types, norms and habits in environmental design” in March, Lionel, The architecture of form, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 465-481. . (Also in “The Environmental Tradition”).

POTVIN, A., BONTEMPS, A., DEMERS, C. (2007), “The Dynamics of Physical Ambiences, Development of a Representation Technique Through a Filmic and Sensory Approach”, ACADIA2007 Conference-Expanding Bodies, Halifax, 1-7 octobre 2007.

POTVIN, A. (2004), “Chapitre 5 : Intermediate Environments”, dans Environment and Diversity, Koen Steemers Ed., E&F Spon Press, London.

POTVIN, A. (2002), ”A Combined Quantitative and Qualitative Approch to Comfort”, dans les Actes de PLEA2002 (Passive Low-Energy Architecture, Toulouse, Juillet 2002.

Siret, D., “Proposition pour une approche déclarative des ambiances dans le projet architectural: application à l’ensoleillement”, PhD thesis, (1997), Université de Nantes, France.

Schiler, Marc, (2000), “Towards a Definition of Glare: Can qualitative issues be quantified?”, 2nd EAAE-ARCC Conference on Architectural Research, July 4-8, Paris, France.

Environmental Adaptability in Architecture

Towards a dynamic multi-sensory approach integrating user’s behavior

SSHRC / CRSH

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), Conseil de recherches en sciences humaines du Canada (CRSH)

Research Grant / 2003-2007 / Subvention de recherche

Post-occupational study of an office building / POE / Étude post-occupationnelle d’un édifice à bureaux

André Potvin, Claude Demers, Marie-Claude Dubois, avec la collaboration de Fariborz Haghighat (Center for building science, University of Concordia), Guy Newsham (National Research Council of Canada), André l’Heureux et l’équipe du GRAP.

Engineering has provided architects and building practitioners with Electronic Control Systems (ECS) with the ability to control building environments. These systems also provide a route to energy savings with consequently great benefits to society. However, the engineering sciences have been unsuccessful in defining how such systems should be operated to improve the environmental experience for building occupants. Such definition demands the input of the social sciences, to elucidate the environmental experience and behaviour of building occupants. Proven linkages between environmental satisfaction, job satisfaction and longer-term well-being only reinforce the urgency of this effort. The construction of the new bioclimatic CDP building in Montreal, with its sophisticated control system to operate lighting, blinds, and temperatures in individual offices offers a unique platform for this research.

Recent review of field evidence show the distinction between environmental comfort responses in air-conditioned buildings versus « bioclimatic » (naturally lit and ventilated) buildings. Occupants of the later had more relaxed expectations and were more tolerant to environmental variations due to their past stimuli and perceived control over their environment. Brager and DeDear (1998), who conducted several studies into the thermal adaptive theory to explain this discrepancy, concluded that this approach acknowledges that thermal perception in the « real world » settings is influenced by the complexities of past thermal history, non-thermal factors, behavioral adjustments and thermal expectations, all four clearly related to movement in architecture and architectural means of controlling the environment. Since a building and its site form an important part of the « circumstances » of the occupants, architecture has the potential to either encourage or restrict adaptive behavior. This research proposes to determine by field study experiments the relativity of environmental comfort through a multi-sensory approach integrating user’s behavior in terms of environmental adjustments and movement through spaces of different environmental conditions.

Objectives

to develop and adapt the methodology for assessing environmental adaptability developed previously by Potvin (2002);
to demonstrate the importance of a multi-sensory approach to environmental comfort by extensive field studies;
to evaluate the role of behavioral adjustments and movement from one space to another on environmental comfort;
to integrate the notion of environmental adaptability into POEs (post-occupancy evaluation) tools; and
to transfer findings to building professionals and other related practitioners.

Anticipated Contribution to the Advancement of Knowledge

Most recent studies on comfort come to the conclusion that we now have to develop means to assess the processes of behavioral adjustment and expectation in order to improve the applicability of the thermal adaptation theory (DeDear, 1998). The PAMPA-3, portable array for the measurement of physical ambiences, issued from a recent SSHRC will be bonified by this research and may become a standard tool for POE (post-occupation evaluation) of new buildings and the retrofit studies of existing buildings. Other benefits from improved understanding of the influence of environmental adaptation include improved predictive models and standards, more sophisticated and responsive environmental controls, enhanced levels of comfort and acceptability among occupants, reduced energy consumption and the encouragement among professionals of climatically and environmentally responsive architecture. The scope of the proposed research is therefore large since it is directly related to the occupants health and well being and the notion of sustainable development in architecture by reducing energy and resources consumption.

Experimental scheme

Longitudinal studies

Quantitative surveys: APMAP

Qualitative surveys: questionnaires

On-line questionnaires are designed to get a maximum of informations from the subjective environmental conditions with the smallest interference, in terms of time, with the subjects’ tasks. In order to do so, tables, figures, sliders and multiple choice questions are used as much as possible.

Hourly questionnaires

2 minutes questionnaire, to be answered at each hour of the working day by all subjects.
Evaluation of the average environmental conditions over the past hour for each stimulus under 3 criterias :

Quality (satisfaction)
Scale (dominance in space)
Time (dominance in time)

Measure of possibilities to make behavioural adjustments

Recherche théorique

Paysages érodés comme générateurs de la forme architecturale | une approche basée sur l’adaptabilité environnementale.

Subvention de recherche-création. Fonds de recherche du Québec – Société et Culture.(2013-2017)

Adaptive Architecture | Experiencing Visual and Thermal Delight in Architecture

The Creative Eye | a digital process exploring visual and thermal diversity in architecture

Environmental Adaptability in Architecture

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