“In these economically challenging times, there is only one certainty: skills matter,” said J Parrish, a director of SmartGeometry Group and a director at ArupSport. “As a result, knowledge of such critically important emerging practices as digital parametrics is vital to the success of not only individuals, but also entire design organizations.”
Added Lars Hesselgren, a director of SmartGeometry Group and research director of Kohn Pederson Fox Associates, “We are privileged to live in a time when all preconceptions of the designing process are disappearing. Complexity is no longer an issue. Design automation is opening new opportunities, but an overall vision for the confluence of digital representation, computational geometry, and digital fabrication is needed to effectively engage this new technology.
“Design tools are as fundamental to the designer as the hammer and saw are to the carpenter. The real tension arrives when the tool utterly changes character, as happens only once in many generations.”
The speakers at SmartGeometry 2009 will share their knowledge of, and vision for, today’s advanced computational and parametric design practices and tools, such as Bentley’s GenerativeComponents. Among these thought leaders are some of the world’s preeminent authorities on the theory and practice of generative design in advanced 3D design applications, including Mark Burry, professor of innovation and director of Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory (SIAL) at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia; Chris Williams, senior lecturer, department of architecture and civil engineering, University of Bath; Saul Griffith, co-founder of Squid Labs and Makani Power Inc., Alameda, Calif.; and Brett Steele, director of the Architectural Association School of Architecture, London.
For details on SmartGeometry 2009, to register, or for an event schedule, visit www.SmartGeometryConference.com. To fill out an inquiry form, visit appsnet.bentley.com/gccontactform. Those interested in attending can review the presentations from SmartGeometry 2007 and 2008 at the above website.
About the SmartGeometry Group
The SmartGeometry Group is firmly committed to the belief that computer-aided design should lend itself to capturing, expressing, and enriching the geometric relationships that form the foundation of architecture. The group is dedicated to educating the construction professions in the new skills required to effectively use advanced design systems such as GenerativeComponents. The directors of the SmartGeometry Group include Lars Hesselgren of Kohn Pederson Fox Associates, Hugh Whitehead of Foster + Partners, and J Parrish of ArupSport. For more information, visit www.smartgeometry.org.
About GenerativeComponents
GenerativeComponents – Bentley’s generative design software – enables architects and engineers to pursue designs and achieve results that were virtually unthinkable before. Empowered by computational methods, the designers can direct their creativity to deliver inspired sustainable buildings that are freer in form and use innovative materials and assemblies. GenerativeComponents facilitates this by allowing the quick exploration of a broad range of “what-if” alternatives for even the most complex buildings.
This unique generative design software captures and exploits the critical relationships between design intent and geometry. Designs can be refined by either dynamically modeling and directly manipulating geometry, by applying rules and capturing relationships among building elements, or by defining complex building forms and systems through concisely expressed algorithms.
To inform decisions, GenerativeComponents is integrated with building information modeling, analysis and simulation software, providing feedback on building materials, assemblies, systems performance, and environmental conditions. This integration also ensures that intent becomes reality by enabling designs to accurately and efficiently flow through to detailed production and fabrication.
GenerativeComponents is enabling leading architects and engineers around the world to deliver inspired sustainable buildings. Among them are Aedas, Arup, Buro Happold, Foster + Partners, Gensler, Grimshaw Architects, Henning Larsen Architects, Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates, Morphosis, SHoP Architects, and tvsdesign.
For additional information about GenerativeComponents and GenerativeComponents Discovery Subscription program, visit www.GenerativeComponents.com.
About Bentley Systems, Incorporated
Bentley is the global leader dedicated to providing comprehensive software solutions for sustaining infrastructure. Architects, engineers, constructors, and owner-operators are indispensable in improving our world and our quality of life; the company’s mission is to improve the performance of their projects and of the assets they design, build, and operate. Bentley sustains the infrastructure professions by helping to leverage information technology, learning, best practices, and global collaboration – and by promoting careers devoted to this crucial work.
Founded in 1984, Bentley has more than 2,800 colleagues, offices in more than 50 countries, annual revenues surpassing $500 million, and, since 1993, has invested more than $1 billion in research, development, and acquisitions. Nearly 90 percent of the Engineering News-Record Top Design Firms are Bentley subscribers, and a 2008 Daratech study ranked Bentley as the world’s #2 provider of geospatial software solutions.
For additional information about Bentley, visit www.bentley.com. To view a searchable collection of the year’s top infrastructure projects from the annual “Be Awards of Excellence” (which this year becomes the Be Inspired Awards), visit www.bentley.com/yearininfrastructure. For information about Be Communities, a social networking site that enables members of the infrastructure community to connect, communicate, and learn from each other, visit http://communities.bentley.com.
Bentley, Be, the “B” Bentley logo, and GenerativeComponents are either registered or unregistered trademarks or service marks of Bentley Systems, Incorporated or one of its direct or indirect wholly owned subsidiaries. All other brands and product names are trademarks of their respective owners.
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