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Generative DesignAutodesk Pier 9 Artist in Residence · 2015
Optimal Bow · Autodesk AIR
An Olympic recurve bow whose riser was designed by a computer. As Artist in Residence at Autodesk Pier 9 in San Francisco, shooting in Golden Gate Park, I asked whether code can be creative and how people can co-design with machines. I scanned an existing bow, set the grip, arrow rest, limb pockets and draw forces as constraints in Dreamcatcher, Autodesk's generative design prototype, and worked back and forth with the solver until it grew a riser optimised for aluminium. The riser was then CNC milled from solid aluminium on a Haas. Featured in Fast Company. The view stands the bow up and replays the solve: the stock block is cut back to the load paths, the stock block shrinks continuously back to the load paths and windows open and widen, as in the Dreamcatcher run, until the final machined riser, then the limbs are strung, the bow is drawn and an arrow is loosed.
- Client
- Autodesk Pier 9 Artist in Residence
- Program
- Autodesk Pier 9 Artist in Residence
- Software
- Autodesk Dreamcatcher (generative design)
- Constraints
- Grip · arrow rest · limb pockets · draw force
- Riser
- 24.5 in · aluminium · CNC milled on a Haas
- Press
- Fast Company · Nov 2015
- Video
- The Optimal · Autodesk, 2015
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