[sort][plot] Seminar Project

Taubman College A + U, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor 2013

Team: Chris Byerly, Junying Chang, Ana Faria Defino, David Zhu

Instructor: Fazin lotfi-Jam

As the wrap-up project of a seminar that was focused on object-oriented programming, our team chose to explore self-generating system and its indication to form and design. Instead of one single system, we decided to combine two systems together: growth system and multi-agent system. In this project, these two systems are analogous to architectural structure and skin.

A growth system was first created to “grow” out of the structure.

Some level of control is achieved by manipulating a set of parameters. However, the growing process is highly autonomous and dynamic. By manually weeding out undesirable outcome, several “moments” of the system was captured and used as the bases for next phase.

Next, a large quantity of agents with Y-shaped body was generated. They were “attracted” to the structure. Once an agent reached its destination, its three tentacles started to find and grab other agents nearby, forming a dense and interlocking layer of skin around structure.

Both system can exist on their own. The change of growth system/underlying structure will not eliminate multi-agent/skin. Instead of dependent to, the skin is always adapting to the structure. This level of independence and adaptability is conceptually close to the biological term of “skin”.