المعماري
12-12-2007, 04:31 ِPM
Every six months period a lot of Austrian architecture firms change interns. Above all they are recruited primary from German colleges of higher education because these students have to do an obligatory internship as a part of their studies. The interns are between 22 and 25 years old. In contrast to many German offices, Austrian traineeships are usually paid.
Mostly these interns do the (Auto) CAD monkey work: area calculation from polylines, counting / repairing blocks, hatching, etcetera (and of course a little model making). Funny enough they're all often educated in ArchiCAD* - an application that should make some of these repetitive tasks obsolete. Recently a 22 years old intern explained our project leader "In ArchiCAD this would be much less work.."
http://anarchitecture.blogspot.com/archicad.gif
Demo screenshot of ArchiCAD 10.
But how important is the choice of software in professional / educational life? At offices BIM (building information system) related software can rationalise the production of architecture, but at schools it might heavily influence the perception of architectural design: Architecture reduced to tools of our software - walls, windows, floors and the roof. Maybe working with ArchiCAD* at university is too much focused on concrete and believable buildings: Is there still space for nonsense and craziness?
It's a weird practice; the character of architectural schools / universities is now divided by their tools: like ArchiCAD* versus Maya or Catia - the masses versus the elite? No matter which tools you use, one fact is clear: software products deeply influence the way we do architecture.
http://anarchitecture.blogspot.com/maya.gif
Demo Screenshot of Autodesk Maya.
* ArchiCAD is very popular in Austria and Germany. Of course there are other tools that do more or less the same stuff: like Autodesk Revit, VectorWorks or Bentley Architecture.
Mostly these interns do the (Auto) CAD monkey work: area calculation from polylines, counting / repairing blocks, hatching, etcetera (and of course a little model making). Funny enough they're all often educated in ArchiCAD* - an application that should make some of these repetitive tasks obsolete. Recently a 22 years old intern explained our project leader "In ArchiCAD this would be much less work.."
http://anarchitecture.blogspot.com/archicad.gif
Demo screenshot of ArchiCAD 10.
But how important is the choice of software in professional / educational life? At offices BIM (building information system) related software can rationalise the production of architecture, but at schools it might heavily influence the perception of architectural design: Architecture reduced to tools of our software - walls, windows, floors and the roof. Maybe working with ArchiCAD* at university is too much focused on concrete and believable buildings: Is there still space for nonsense and craziness?
It's a weird practice; the character of architectural schools / universities is now divided by their tools: like ArchiCAD* versus Maya or Catia - the masses versus the elite? No matter which tools you use, one fact is clear: software products deeply influence the way we do architecture.
http://anarchitecture.blogspot.com/maya.gif
Demo Screenshot of Autodesk Maya.
* ArchiCAD is very popular in Austria and Germany. Of course there are other tools that do more or less the same stuff: like Autodesk Revit, VectorWorks or Bentley Architecture.