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Showing posts with label draw. Show all posts
Showing posts with label draw. Show all posts
Posted in: GARDEN OF COSMIC SPECULATIONS
GARDEN OF COSMIC SPECULATIONS
This amazing peace of work called “Garden of Cosmic Speculations“. This is garden was made by famous landscape architect Charles Jencks and his wife Maggie Keswick. It all began as his wife’s idea to dray a mire on their estate in Scotland, and that gave space to Charles Jencks to play around and create.
his project occupied life of Mr. Jencks for last 20 years. he tryed with this “Garden of Cosmic Speculations” to answer some questions, such as: “What are atoms made of and how should we conceive of them? How does DNA make up a living organism and why is it essential to celebrate it in a garden?”
Domes : A Unique Addition
Domes : A Unique Addition
Cristine Timmons December 31, 2008, 8:30 a.m. Featured Dome Homes
Monolithic Dome addition — This 36’ diameter dome adds needed space with little increase in overall energy costs.
Is it a UFO?
The night after our home addition was inflated, some of the neighbors thought a UFO had landed. A soft orange glow radiated from the elliptical bubble. It almost seemed alive.
Sound like something from a science fiction movie? The foam and concrete dome has something to do with science, but there’s nothing fictional about it. When my husband, Chuck Cozzolino, and I decided to add some living space to our ranch-style house, we looked into several possibilities. A traditional box shaped addition would have been a good architectural choice, but would have been too expensive for the amount of space and energy efficiency we wanted.
Thinking domes
So we decided to look into the kind of home I’d been fascinated with since the 70s, when I first read about them in Mother Earth News. Geodesic domes, sold mostly in kit form, are formed by joining pyramid-shaped tetrahedrons together. These domes are usually framed in wood and the outside is covered by shingles or cedar shakes.
Most companies who sell kits offer a basic package containing directions and material to frame the dome. Some offer triangle and pentagon windows, roof shingles and interior drywall or wood paneling for an extra cost.
Domes save energy because there is less surface area per square foot to heat or cool compared to the square or rectangular home. It also allows wind to blow around it rather than into it. The curved surface also has drawbacks. It’s difficult to shingle and the triangle studs that form the inside walls make dry walling a nightmare. We planned on doing most of the work ourselves and the thought of these two jobs made us continue our dome search. We found a company in Florida that manufactured a concrete and foam geodesic kit. This was an appealing idea because the prefabricated triangles didn’t need to be shingled. The concrete panels needed only to be seamed with cement and painted.
The triangle panels could be ordered with precut drywall attached to the inside but would still need to be finished. We decided to visit a couple in Tennessee who had built one. The open floor plan made the inside of the 34 foot diameter dome look spacious. A loft covering half of the interior, overlooked the living and dining room. The house was radiant heated with hot water tubing in the floor. With Tennessee’s relatively mild winters and the exceptional efficiency of the home, the couple’s electric bill was minimal. Two ceiling fans kept the dome cool in summer.
Discovering Monolithic
We were about to order one of these kits when I saw something I’d never seen before in a dome magazine. Instead of being made out of triangles or tetrahedrons it was one flowing shape. It was called a Monolithic Dome. We immediately sent for more information.
We found out that these domes are built in a very unusual way. After a concrete ring foundation is poured, a heavy vinyl Airform is manufactured to the shape and size of home requested. The Airform is spread out and fastened to the foundation. Large blower fans inflate the Airform and remain on during the construction process. Everything else is done from inside. The doors and windows are framed in. Then several layers of polyurethane foam are sprayed on the interior surface of the Airform until there is approximately 3 inches. Steel reinforcing rebar is attached to the foam followed by three inches of Shotcrete, a special spray mix of concrete. The Shotcrete can be smoothed out or left as is for a textured effect and is usually spray painted white. Other than that, the interior wall is complete.
The vinyl Airform is the only covering needed on the outside and will last 10 to 15 years before it needs to be painted or stuccoed. Because the rigid foam insulation is on the outside (protected by the vinyl) and the concrete is on the inside, the dome acts as a heat sink, storing heat in the winter and keeping it out in the summer. This is the most energy efficient housing we read about aside from underground housing. It’s also one of the strongest.
Chuck and I loved everything about the Monolithic Dome except for one thing. Like the other domes, it was being sold to the do-it-yourselfer. There were two companies owned by brothers who had been building these domes since the 70s. Barry South’s company, Dome Technology in Idaho, continued in the business of building large domes for use as churches, schools and storage facilities. They had built a large temple in South Bend, Indiana, for Lester Summerall’s ministry.
David South owns Monolithic Constructors, Inc. in Texas. His company makes Airforms, trains people to build domes of all sizes, and spreads the word about Monolithic Domes via a quarterly news publication.
After many phone conversations I finally convinced David South to contract his brother to construct our dome.
Dome up!
After the crew attached the Airform to the foundation, it took less than half an hour to inflate. A light made the dome translucent for a couple of nights until the foam made the structure opaque. Lots of people stopped by to see what was going on. It took four builders exactly one week to raise the 36 foot diameter dome. The cost of the project was $34,000, which included site preparation, foundation and floor, plumbing and electricity, radiant floor heat, window and doors and the connection between the ranch and dome. We have run into some problems, but most of them have been solved. We lost a lot of heat through the windows the first winter, but we now cover then with foam panels at night and our total heating bill is only a few dollars more than before the addition. We also had problems with leaking windows that for the most part have been taken care of. Every year we do a little more to the interior. Chuck is just finishing a concrete block shower for what will eventually be the bathroom. A loft is also slated for the future. The floor plan will remain open, except for the bath and utility rooms. We’ve enjoyed our new addition for four years now, but one of the things we like the best is how music sounds in here. Rock, blues, jazz and classical – you’d think the performance was going on right in the room with you.
A dome, particularly a concrete dome, isn’t for everyone. But if you like open spaces, room flexibility, low utility bills, strength you can count on, great acoustics and a Jetsons meets the Flinstones look, try one. We think you’ll like it.
Note: Cristine Timmons is a writer for The Herald-Palladium newspaper in St. Joseph, Michigan. Reprinted with permission from The Herald-Palladium in the Fall 1997 Roundup.
How to Draw Big Ben
How to Draw Big Ben
STEP 1.Hey there. Let's tackle this monster of a building. Big Ben is the clock tower on the Palace of Westminster in London, England. Well, technically it's the name of the bell inside the tower, but I wouldnt've have known that if I hadn't read it on Wikipedia. ANYWAY, let's begin, shall we? To start, draw a skewed rectangular shape for one side of the clock face. I guess that would be called a parallelogram.
STEP 2.Next we're going to draw the opposing side of the clock face with another downward parallelogram. The general shape here looks like an open greeting card.
STEP 3.Next we want to draw some vertical lines descending from the corners of the previous shapes. This will create the main shape of the tower. Note that on the outer lines, there's a small dip inward toward the top.
STEP 4.Here we're going to place a short box on top of the part that holds the clock. The width of this shape is smaller than that of the rest of the tower.
STEP 5.Next, let's draw a bell-like shape above one side of that box. This will form one side of a sloped roof.
STEP 6.Let's complete the shape on the opposing side of the tower and draw a line cutting across the bottom to indicate the underside of that roof, which overlaps the box underneath.
STEP 7.Slap a tiny box on top of that roof!
STEP 8.Leaving a small space inbetween, draw a triangular shape above the small box. Draw the bottom as a straight line, but have the sides slope inward to a point at the top.
STEP 9.Here, draw another sloping triangle shape to complete the "cone" shape, and draw connecting lines to the box below. Once again, this shows the underside of the overlapping roof.
STEP 10.Here we'll draw the roof of the actual palace that Big Ben is connected to. At the point the basic shape of the building is complete!
STEP 11.Draw a pair of parallelograms (that's a mouthful) for the borders of the actual clock face.
STEP 12.Draw a pair of verticle lines on each side of the tower below the clock section.
STEP 13.Next draw four horizontal bars along the front side of the tower, and continue those on the other side.
STEP 14.This is where we begin to add some detail. Since there is SO much detail on Big Ben, it's impossible to capture every bit of it. Thus, we're forced to simplify. The vertical "bars" on each edge of the tower are covered in grooves. Let's indicate those first by wrapping wavy, zig-zag lines around them. Match these up with the bars from Step 13.
STEP 15.Draw a row of 7 oval "pill" shapes above and below the clock section. Have the lower row be a bit bolder than the top. Just below, draw a series of 7 small arches as a guide for the next step.
STEP 16.Next draw a row of 7 vertical stripes on each square section of the tower below the clock. Use a large brush and keep the tops and bottoms rounded.
STEP 17.On the small box at the top, draw a row of 5 short stripes.
STEP 18.Using a much thinner line, mirror the previous two steps along the opposing side of the tower.
STEP 19.Moving away from the main tower for a bit, draw evenly-spaced towers along the side of the palace. If you're working on a computer, you can cheat a bit by using Copy>Paste. Make sure the tops of the towers line up with the perspective on the top of the roof.
STEP 20.Once again we're reducing the complex detail of this structure to a very, very simple form. Using simple curves, draw a peak between the small towers of the palace. Add the tops of a few towers from the opposite side of the building peering over the top of the roof.
STEP 21.Back to the main tower, draw a series of concentric circles (sharing the same center) within the square of the clock face.
STEP 22.Next draw 6 lines intersecting at the center of the circles on each clock face.
STEP 23.Erase the center of the lines from Step 22 and draw in the arms of the clock.
STEP 24.Here is where we really get into the finer details of the structure. As I mentioned before, it's nearly impossible to draw every single detail. For time's sake, we're doing to simplify and indicate some of the main details. On the triangular roof sections, note the small "window" shapes. These and the spires from the corners of the roofs are key details. Indicate the grooves of the tower's surface and small details surrounding the clock face.
STEP 25.Again keeping it very loose and simple, indicate the windows on the palace, along with some of the grooves and general details. Since Big Ben is the focus of this tutorial, I went very loose with these details.
STEP 26.Ok, this step is pretty hardcore. It's also optional. You'll notice the main lines of the tower are pretty bold and sterile. If you're on the computer, use the Eraser tool next. If you're doing this by hand, you might want to use a white gel pen or any other white paint/ink/gesso/gouache/whatever. Go in and start eating away at those bold lines with your brush. Leave the outer lines mostly intact and focus on the inner edge of those lines. Keep your marks ragged and feel free to tap around and be random. This step will transform your drawing from a collection of flat shapes to a detailed-looking, highly-rendered illustration. I could keep working on sections of this image for countless hours, but I'm going to step back, slap some color on it, and call it a day. Hope you all enjoyed!
How to Draw a Skyscraper
How to Draw a Skyscraper
STEP 1.Okay lets get on the ball with this first step. This is going to be very simple. All you have to do is draw a total of five vertical lines that are slightly tilted inward with the two shapes on the ends being smaller than the rest. Next draw the boxed shape of the building shape on the left as well as the guidelines the goes in horizontal direction.
\STEP 2.In this next step you will start drawing out the vertical lines on the building structure to prepare your skyscraper for all the small looking windows you will place there in the next step. Make sure your lines are nice and straight as well as evenly spaced apart. Once that is done draw a horizontal line on the bottom of the building to make way for the solid structure.
STEP 3.In this next step you will start drawing out each individual window in the skyscraper and all the windows are perfectly square with the largest of them being at the bottom. You will then color in all the windows and then write out your own name for your skyscraper. The building to the left also needs design as you can see, so what you will do is draw out the designing. On the right side of the skyscraper you will leave the windows hollow looking.
\STEP 4.This is your last drawing step and all you will need to do is draw out the rest of the squared windows just as you did in step three. Add some sign detailing to the bottom of the building including show lights and banners. Erase any visible sketch lines, or guidelines that you drew in step one. The horizontal line that you drew above the building is you skyline.
STEP 5.Once you are done your skyscraper should come out looking like the one you see here. All you have to do now is add some color for a day or night time sky and some color to your building as well. You have just learned how to draw a skyscraper step by step.
