Programmable New York Times

I found this article yesterday on my favorite pop culture website Buzzfeed.

It is interesting that the New York Times is realizing who their new demographic will be and reaching out to them (us) in a way that we can relate. I personally don't read but a few articles in the Times because most of their articles are too in-depth for me. But imagine if only the articles you would be interested in show up in the margins of your blog, or in your Google searching. Or if the opposite happened, and the Times took a cue from your Twitter message or blog post about news that is happening or something spreading virally around the internet. It could mean a dumbing down of news, or it could mean news that is more relevant to its audience and therefore more likely to be read and passed along.

Parti Sketch Model 3

This parti looks at engaging the building with/into the site. The north and south parts of the building extend out towards a main thoroughfare and a new pedestrian bridge, respectively. The building reaches out towards the river while the street and bike path pass underneath it.

I am working on building it into my site model for the review.

Parti Sketch Model 2

Parti Sketch Model 1

I imagine that the wood wall would create an entrance by slashing through the building and out the exterior. Because it is so broken up, it would allow views through the building and into other spaces, while drawing you into and through the building.

A screen wall extends vertically through the building to create an area for information to be projected and to act as a meeting point upon entrance.

The parti model ended up being much more monolithic and solid in the photos than it was as I was building it. I suppose the scale is off as well and the building should be larger. I will attempt to fix those issues in the second and third iterations.











I really like the juxtaposition of these last two images; taken from the same angle, one with flash and one without. Flash has made the model seem completely flat, while without, the natural shadows create a great depth and complexity.

Processing

Processing is an open source programming software for images, videos, interactions, etc. It can be used to create random objects and shapes as well as input information and have the program be completely interactive.

My two favorites are We Feel Fine, which scans blogs for feeling words that you can then sort by feeling, age, location, weather. By clicking on the excerpts, you will be taken directly to the original blog. The other is The Dumpster, which is similar to We Feel Fine in that it scans blogs for stories of teenage breakups.

Then there is Net Worth, which with a scan of your credit card Googles your name and places it on the map in order of number of hits.

The commonality of these projects is that they take something non-visual, such as number of Google hits or a break up and turns them into visual interactive work. I am thinking about how this can apply to my project; whether I write something specific for Processing to make and allow it to inform my project or if it just the idea of the program and its abilities.

Program: Integration

Not as successful as I thought, but I have begun to get ideas about the exterior. I think the program elements should express themselves individually and be differentiated. I also think that perhaps the larger elements should create sort of the core of the building and smaller elements should be on the exterior to create more visual interest.