Overall Reflection: At the beginning of the year, I had no idea what to expect during this unit and was not so keen on having debates and blog posts as part of the assignments. Eventually, after a number of trail debates between groups during class, I felt more confident and had learnt a lot about the structure of a debate as well as strengths and weak points. Despite the fact that most debate topics had nothing to do with Spatial Design, I actually enjoyed learning about the different views of fellow classmates on these topics as well as presenting my own on a topic that means a lot to me. I also found it hard to keep up with blog posts and what to write in them but after a while I got the hang of it. Hypothesis: The final assignment consisted of critically analysing and evaluating a topic of choice in depth and presenting those findings in an essay. At first I could not fully understand the purpose of the task. After going over the chosen title for my thesis a number of times , I started asking myself why I chose that title. It was a title that really meant a lot to me considering that that is the path that I will hopefully take after finishing the degree. This allowed me to go into more detail on important elements within the project as well as widen my knowledge on the subject. After coming up with a number of hypothesis questions and doing some research as well as consult with the lecturer, the best hypothesis was chosen. Despite thinking that once the title was chosen that the rest would be easy, I found it to be quite the opposite. Upon conducting further research I came to realise that I was taking the subject too literally and wasn't looking in between the lines for more in-depthfindings. The title was slightly arranged after consulting with the lecturer again and I reached to more elaborate conclusions. I believe that this unit will definitely come to use when we are preparing for our thesis in the coming year, if the proposal is accepted. I also believe that I could have done better in this task especially when trying to demonstrate critical thinking within the essay, and putting forward a convincing and objective evaluation.
0 Comments
As mentioned in a previous post, I was having trouble finding a tutor for my thesis. After speaking with a number of lecturers as well as the director of our institute, I was advised against the proposed title and frankly I do not think they fully understood what I was proposing. When they heard the word "lighting" as being the main element within the project they simply assumed that it would be too technical of a project. Finally I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, after speaking with the same lecturer who advised me to speak to the director, he completely understood what I had in mind and helped me to find middle ground in what I wanted the project to be while at the same time adding that design element that the institute wanted. Instead of having the title "The beautification of the Nadur Historical Centre by means of a holistic lighting design", which gives the impression that I would be going into technical matters, I will now think of better titles which could include maybe designing a part of the square itself whilst still having lighting as the main element of the project. A number of existing projects including that of Paola which is being worked on at the moment were suggested for me to research and get more ideas. The location could not just be the Nadur square but other squares which have dis-levered land which could make the overall design more interesting to work with. Preferably an area for which I could find existing plans since squares are quite large, conducting a complete site survey would not be easy. Brainstorming Titles: Pedestrianising the Nadur Historical Centre by means of creating an interactive space combining light. Renovating the Nadur Historical Centre The regeneration of the Nadur Historical Centre by means of a Holistic Lanscape and Lighting Design Introduction: Very brief history on the topic of Lighting Design and how it evolved. A general overview on the chosen hypothesis and what the paper is going to be about including some main elements to be presented in the following. It should be clear enough for the viewer who maybe has no knowledge on the subject and interesting enough for them to continue reading. Possibly to include more than one paragraph.
Body: Present the main points for this hypothesis from a variety of reliable sources.To be focused on:
Conclusion: A summery of what was mentioned and the conclusions reached whether proved or not approved. Mentioning weaknesses and strengths of the said hypothesis and the research presented. We are approaching the end of the second semester and unfortunately I am still consulting with a number of lecturers to find an appropriate tutor to guide me with the thesis project. As already mentioned in a previous post, I was having trouble finding a tutor. After consulting with one of the lecturers he suggested I speak to the director so a meeting was set up, hoping that this issue would be resolved. Unfortunately this was not the case since the director believes that what I am proposing is not in line with what has been delivered during the three year program. Another point presented during the meeting was that lighting was too far off from Spatial Design however I believe otherwise. Having worked in the field for two summers myself, I have witnessed countless of design projects lacking one of the most important elements within a project which is lighting. Properly illuminating a space should be part of the design from the very beginning and should not just be an engineers job, which is what the director believes. I have been passionate about this subject and knowing that I will definitely continue my studies on it specifically, I wanted to have a chance at presenting my ideas and pitting them to use in this project. The project in itself was tackling an ongoing problem within already built spaces. I was advised to use lighting as an integral component within the project such as the use of flood-lights at Ground Zero in New York but frankly I do not understand the point of this suggestion since the latter still falls under the subject of Lighting Design. I understand that I am not an engineer, but I am a designer and I was thought to consider a number of elements within my designs including lighting, both from school and work experience. Maybe I am just not explaining my self properly when speaking to lecturers or the director but I will most definitely not give up on something I have been wanting to do since before I joined the degree. This was one of the main reasons I applied for a course at MCAST after attending University, to hopefully pursue my studies in Lighting design after finishing the degree in Spatial Design.
A few months back, together with some class mates a trip was planned to visit Milan during the Milan Design Week. Last weekend came along and we had the opportunity of spending an entire weekend in the beautiful city of Milan. More importantly we were going to visit the Milan Design Week which was very exciting considering we are design students. It was a new experience for all of us, getting to see both international and national designers , meeting new people and discovering things we had never seen before apart from visiting Milan's tourist attractions of course.
Seeing as both my thesis and hypothesis were related to lighting , I was eager to visit an entire section from the fair on lighting. Philips and Artemide were two of the stalls that really stood out, which also happened to be two of my favourite design companies. They have been such an inspiration to me so far when working on my thesis and hypothesis that I couldn't wait to see some products in front of my eyes and maybe get a booklet or two for some more information. Besides regular visitors, we encountered a number of business men/women or design companies that were looking for products to incorporate within their designs. This visit helped in getting to know about new design companies as well as learn new information on the ones we already knew about. With the current projects we have this semester it was a great inspiration for unit such as retail or classrooms design because now we had fresh ideas and discovered new products which could be incorporated within uor design. I will most definitely attend a design week in the years to come, especially since we live on such a small island with little opportunities where different ideas are somewhat limited. I am dedicating this post to talk about one of the tasks within this unit. Criticising fellow classmates during their turn for the debates was not an easy task to say the least. I was pretty frustrated when some debaters did not let us record the debate. I understand that it is their right to do so but I myself don't find it comfortable for someone to record me speaking but since I knew it would help my friends when analysing it I gave the go ahead and expected the same in return.
Since some students were speaking with a fast rhythm when it comes to presenting, mostly because of nervousness, it was hard to keep up with what was being said and at the same time write down notes. I managed to jot down the major points within each debate I was present for as well as how the debaters presented the information and who I believe had done better out of each set. A common problem encountered were the nerves which were easily noticeable through one's speech. I found the debates very interesting and most students did show they had done in depth research before hand with the expedition of one pair not eve attending for their debate. Another noticeable point was the fact that most were reading directly from notes which I myself ended up doing since we found it impossible to remember all that information especially when nervous whilst having your opponent staring at you right opposite. That was indeed quite intimidating, even more so since we were being timed. Overall there were a number of good debates were both sides did quite well and presented their information clearly and effectively. Philips, one of the world’s leading lighting design companies, claims that nowadays public lighting is being used for aesthetics whereas for many years it's main purpose was to guide drivers. There has been a shift from roadway lighting to lighting for people throughout the years. The company believes in using the latest technology advancements in LED lighting solutions to illuminate cities. In the document “Experience how architectural lighting can breathe life into your city”, they mention how a common misconception is that the brighter the lighting, the safer the locality. In reality, excessive use of light is not needed to evoke public security. However very often light trespass is created, which is the unwanted spilling of light onto private properties. This not only looks unpleasant but is a complete waste of energy. It can easily be avoided with the appropriate lighting fixtures. Anya Paskovic (2012) adds on how very few cities have shown such an interest in lighting design. She presents valid points on how to achieve a successful lighting plan : Lighting cannot be designed appropriately if the existing space and existing lighting is taken for granted. She also suggests Performance Based Zoning' to regulate the intensity of light depending on the area. Another point presented is to take advantage of tested concepts and technologies. These are some of the issues which I will make sure to present within my hypothesis essay since it proves how one should use the appropriate lighting fixtures within a space.
References: Paskovic,A., 2012. Planning for Public Spaces in Vancouver’s Southeast False Creek. M.Pl. Queen’s University Available at:http://qspace.library.queensu.ca/handle/1974/7464 [Accessed 28 March 2017]. Philips, 2014. Experience how architectural lighting can breathe life into your city. [pdf] Philips. Available at: http://www.lighting.philips.com/b-dam/b2b-li/en_AA/Applications/masthead-pdfs/Architecture-Landscape-brochure-LR-spread.pdf [Accessed 28 March 2017]. After having the opportunity to experience working abroad for two months, upon returning back to school in November, I had to make up for the lost lectures during that time. With this I also came back to find a number of assignments which I had yet to start working on and submit.
As always I find myself comparing MCAST's system to that of the University and with that said, I strongly believe that when a student is accepted for erasmus the subject being missed during that period should be compensated for. I managed to finish every assignment on time expect for one in particular which involved group work. Since everyone had already been set up in groups, I had to do work which should have been divided by three by myself and to be honest I did not mind this since an extension was granted. Part of the assignment included listening to presentations by other groups and compare and contrast these presentations. Of course I had missed the presentations since I was still on the program. I then had to set up a meeting with the lecturer for her to explain what was expected in the task and what subject I were to conduct the research on. Unfortunately this meeting never happened until only few weeks ago, months after I returned from the Erasmus program since we could not find a sloth were both of us were available to meet. As we are approaching the last weeks of the second semester, assignments from the first semester were the last thing on my mind, however I had to complete them. I was also offered to meet the lecturer to check my work before submitting but I did not want to keep hanging on to it any longer so as soon as I finished I uploaded it to get it over and done with. I still believe that MCAST should arrange the erasmus-assignment issue as I ended up having double the work when coming back. Erasmus is not a holiday as many may think but a two month internship with a company , working full-time hours everyday. Coming back and having to catch up with two months of work is the last thing on your mind. There should be some sort of compensation or maybe some work should be reduced (such as group work) depending on the given task. During this weeks lecture we had the opportunity to present our findings as a team against public CCTV while the other half of the class were in favour. Before I had started researching the topic I was in favour, however after some time researching I completely changed my mind on how I viewed public CCTV. Below are a number of strong points and questions from what we found as a group from reliable sources on the internet:
Questions to be asked:
Advantages that could be used as arguments from the opponent group: May prove to be effective in catching Petty crimes. Response: Most of the time cameras that catch such crimes are through private cameras anyways which are owned by the shop or office itself. Disadvantages of having public CCTV installed:
Some state that the abuse of cctv cameras is a conspiracy theory, however the American Civil Liberties Union and a number of news websites talk about a scandal which happened during the Civil Rights movement and the Vietnam War, for example, the FBI - as well as many individual police departments around the nation - conducted illegal operations to spy upon and harass political activists who were challenging racial segregation and the Vietnam War. This comes to show how these cameras can be abused not only by hackers but the institution itself. Case study of CCTVS not being effective: Londoners are under greater surveillance than anyone else in the democratic world. Sociologists carrying multiple studies on this issue have found that they have not reduced crime throughout the years. As found in one study on a BBC article, the "reductions were noted in certain categories but there was no evidence to suggest that the cameras had reduced crime overall in the city centre." The same study from 2005 for the British Home Office, also found that cameras did not cut crime or the fear of crime (as had a study back in 2002, which was also for the British government). References BBC News, 2005. CCTV systems fail to cut crime. BBC News. Available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/leicestershire/4294693.stm [Accessed 6 March 2017]. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/2192911.stm Li.A., 2016. Pros and Cons of surveillance cameras in public spaces. Available at: https://reolink.com/pros-cons-of-surveillance-cameras-in-public-places/ [Accessed 6 March 2017]. Lighting is going to be the main element within my project if accepted, therefore I must consider a number of things apart from aesthetics, including energy efficiency. The current lighting system is not efficient at all since it still uses old filament bulbs which were installed in the 90's and have never been updated to the latest technologies. This not only makes the space look aesthetically unpleasing but also raises electricity bills for the village since old filaments are known for wasting more energy. Below are some points from multiple sources regarding this issue:
References Verger,H., (n.d). Benefits of upgrading city lighting. PHILIPS. Available at: http://www.lighting.philips.com/main/education/lighting-university/lighting-university-browser/webinar/sustainable-city-lighting. [Accessed 20 February 2017]. New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, 2002. How to guide to effective energy-efficient street lighting. [pdf] New York: New York State Energy Research and Development Authority. Available at: http://www.rpi.edu/dept/lrc/nystreet/how-to-planners.pdf [Accessed 6 January 2017]. Denniston, S.P., 2007. Identifying the Impact of Energy Efficient Lighting Strategies for Use in Historic Preservation. M.A: University of Pennsylvania. Available at: http://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1072&context=hp_theses. [Accessed 20 February 2017]. Philips, 2011. Energy efficient LED lighting from around the world. [pdf] The Netherlands: Philips Lighting. Available at: http://www.philips.com/consumerfiles/newscenter/main/standard/resources/corporate/articles/2011/2011-0487_Energy-efficient-LED-book_Final.pdf [Accessed 17 January 2017]. |
Rita Curmi2nd year Student Archives
May 2017
Categories |