This film was a pleasure to make: sitting with Kayvan Karimi, chatting with Anna Rose and creating an ‘old-school’ #spacesyntax model by hand with pen, ruler and trace.
The film explores the pros and cons of digital versus analogue methods of analysis and design. The potentials of immersive digital experiences are enormous and, as I say in film, the capabilities of digital tools outstrip what we did previously without them.
Nevertheless, concerns are often raised about the loss of hand skills in architecture (such as sketching and model-making) witthe implication being that the digital designprocess is less natural than the analogue.
Having worked in an ‘electronic environment’ for over 40 years, I no longer see the difference between drawing on paper, tablet or screen. But I prefer to work digitally for ease of creation, editing, storage and sharing.
I don’t see anything diminishing or dehumanising about the digital world. For me it’s akin to thinking and to dreaming: seeing images and places without tangible form. And then it adds something else: the ability to bring other people into those places, wherever they happen to be.
However, I know that many people over my age (58) have worked largely, if not entirely, in analogue. The digital world is less familiar and it’s possible to imagine why it can appear alien or inferior.
The same is not so true of people younger than me. And increasingly so. In the next decade, as the current generation of analogue leaders gives way to digital natives, the production, development and dissemination of design ideas will, I believe, be greatly enhanced. Each part of the design process will benefit from the digital input of, for example, an immersive projection or AI algorithm.
But whether it’s in sketching, engagement or critical review, the design process relies on human judgment – not least because the combined effects of cultures, climates and contexts mean that no two buildings and no two places are ever truly the same.
Will it take another decade for the machines to figure those out? We seem to be close with climate and context. Or will the unpredictability of cultural change be the elusive phenomenon that sustains the relevance of the imaginative brain and the creative hand?
Tim Stonor 