tangible grasshopper: a method to combine physical models with generative, parametric tools

Tangible Grasshopper

Amethod to combine physical models with generative, parametric tools

Boris Plotnikov1, Gerhard Schubert2, Frank Petzold31,2,3Technische Universität München / Chair for Architectural [email protected] 2,3{schubert|petzold}@tum.de

The use of digital tools in the early, creative design process is the focus of aninterdisciplinary teaching and research project. Starting from the question of howa seamless connection between physical and digital tools could be made possible,the proposed method tries to bridge the gap between both methodologies andprovide intuitive, visual and collaborative design coupled with advanced, realtime computer simulations. A design platform has been developed which supportsa seamless connection between freely shaped physical models, GIS data andGrasshopper3D. The environment combines the reconstructed physical modelswith the digital one (surrounding buildings) and passes the information to acustom Grasshopper3D plug-in which serves as a link to existing and customdeveloped simulative tools. All simulations are performed and visualized in realtime to support the intuitive and iterative design process.

Keywords: urban design, tangible interface, grasshopper, sustainable design,design decision support

INTRODUCTIONPhysical models have always played a central rolethroughout the design process for architects and ur-ban planners. Such models help in analyzing andunderstanding the context, intuitively convey de-sign ideas and work collaboratively. In the last fewdecades and with the popularization and enhance-ments in the field of computation, computer toolsbecame prominent in the field of architecture, firstmainly as tools to enhance efficiency and producetechnical drawings, but in recent years also as deci-sion support tools in a variety of fields such as cli-mate, construction andmobility. As these tools grewto be more advanced they usually also grew in com-plexity, often resulting in a less intuitive process and

requiring a long time to master. Such advantagesand limitationshavebeendiscussed inprevious stud-ies (Weytjens et al. 2012).

The proposed method tries to bridge the gapbetween the physical and digital design methodolo-gies and provide intuitive, visual and collaborativedesign coupled with advanced, real time computersimulations. A physical design platform has been de-veloped which supports a seamless connection be-tween freely shaped physical models, GIS data andGrasshopper3D. The environment combines the re-constructed physicalmodels with the digital one andpasses the information to a custom Grasshopper3Dplug-in which serves as a link to existing and customdeveloped simulative tools. All simulations are per-

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formed and visualized in real time to support the in-tuitive and iterative design process.

BACKGROUNDAs CAAD tools grew in popularity, their influenceand reach expanded to a wide array of spheres in-cluding but not limited to structural, climate, en-ergy use, acoustics and mobility analysis. The useof these tools, which were hard to master and veryspecific was usually limited only to specialists, result-ing in a linear process where many evaluations wereconducted only after the design process for valida-tion purposes and not assisting in informing the de-sign. In recent years there have been multiple at-tempts to bridge the gap between architects andother professions involved in the building industryby grouping and incorporating evaluation and simu-lative tools in existing CAD and BIM tools, notably ontopof Rhinoceros andGrasshopper3D. Someof thesetools are Diva [1], a daylighting and energymodelingplug-in and Ladybug and Honeybee (Sadeghipour-Roudsari and Pak 2013), two open source environ-mental plug-ins meant to help designers create anenvironmentally-conscious architectural design. Re-cently a plug-in called UMI (Reinhart et al. 2013) usedtoevaluate theenvironmental performanceof neigh-borhoods and cities was also released. In contrast toDiva, Ladybug andHoneybee, UMI focuses on the ur-ban context, providing less detailed, larger scale re-sults.

These and other tools simplify the evaluation ofdesigns by allowing the user to model and run sim-ulations in a single program, eliminating the need tomaster a variety of tools and minimizing the risk ofincompatibilities due to manually converted geom-etry. While running some of the simulations insidethe plug-ins, more advanced simulations are beingrun by verified tools in the background such as Radi-ance (WardandShakespeare2004) andDaysim (Rein-hart and Walkenhorst 2001) for daylight simulationsand Energyplus (Crawley et al. 2000) and OpenStu-dio (Guglielmetti et al. 2011) for energy and thermalsimulations. Although these tools help to inform the

design from rather early stages, the process of set-tingup themodels and running the simulations is stilltime consuming and the interaction with the modelis limited and requires technical expertise.

APPROACHTypical design workflow is becoming increasingly in-terlinked with digital tools, especially when address-ing the neighborhood and the urban scale. As a di-rect result, professionals involved in urban designand planning require longer technical training, notnecessarily for their main expertise but in order tokeep up to date with current digital tools. The natureof working in front of a screen does not promote col-laboration, especially in the design realm, and peo-ple from different fields without knowledge in theused software are excluded from the process alto-gether. As collaboration is at least at times manda-tory, both for approval of projects and for discussionsbetween designers, consultants and decision mak-ers, the design process is often paused and muchwork is spent preparing a simplified and accessiblerepresentation of the progress. At times such repre-sentations are meaningful and concise, but more of-ten they are simplified andpartial and potentially notrepresentative of the bigger whole. Often the designis paused and static representations such as imagesand schemes are produced. A task which is time con-suming butmore importantly disconnected from theactual design. One of the unfortunate byproducts isthat these collaborations are occurring seldom andat later stages of the design, by which point fewerchanges are likely to occur.

Figure 1Seamlessconnectionbetween tangibleobjects andGrasshopper 3D.

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The method proposed addresses these limitationsand suggests both a conceptual shift in common de-sign practices and a practical solution which facili-tates such a shift. By first minimizing configurationand setup time by seamless GIS integration, a phys-ical design platform and a set of predefined digitalsimulations the process can start much faster and al-lows the participants to focus on design rather thanon technical aspects. Once started, the process nolonger needs to be fragmented and disconnected.The designer can work in an intuitive physical 3D en-vironment by manipulating physical masses on topof the digital data or in a digital environment tak-ing advantage of commonly used and validated toolsand simulations, Rhinocorous3D andGrasshopper3Dserving as the digital environment as well as thebridge for other software. Both processes comple-ment each other as they are different ways of work-ing with the same model, meaning no conversion orsynchronization is required. Such a setup is alsomoreconvenient for showcasing and discussing designs inlarger and sometimes cross disciplinary groups. Theprocess does not need to be paused, representedin another way for a different audience and thenconverted back, rather one continuous iterative pro-cess with an efficient feedback loop exists, harness-ing both advanced digital tools and physical intuitivedesign strategies.

By linking between digital tools with physicalmodels which require no configuration or programspecific knowledge, the proposedmethod addressesthe early stages of design, when very little apart fromthe context is already known. As such the urban andneighborhood scales are targeted and the methodprovides quick and meaningful simulations whichevaluate design decisions such as massing possibil-ities and their effects on surrounding buildings andthe public realm. By linking this tool with existingdesign tools such as physical models, it is possible tocontrol and monitor simulations through already es-tablished mechanisms. For example, changes madeto the physical model will have an immediate and di-rect effect on the results of digital simulations and

analysis. This allows for a quick assessment andcomparison of the potentials and issues of designvariants, directed and determined by developmentsmade in physical models. It is also important to notethat more detailed and accurate simulations are tobe performed at the building scale at a later stagewhenmore about the design is known. Thus the pro-posed method provides a complimentary and an in-tuitive toolset for early design stages, supporting thedesigner by providing real-time analyses and a qual-itative comparison between alternatives.

ScenarioTo illustrate the benefit of the proposed methodol-ogy, a scenario describing the development processof a new housing neighborhood was chosen. An ar-chitectural firm has won a public competition orga-nized by the city to design the master plan for thesite. Therewere already several preliminarymeetingsin which the city officials expressed their main goalsand requirements and now the architects initiated ameeting with the city officials and consultants in thefields of transportation, mobility, climate, energy useand acoustics in order to discuss several massing al-ternatives and receive feedback. The participants aregathered around a large multi-touch table and a bigscreen, showing a plan view and a perspective of thesite respectively. Both surfaces show the latest dig-ital model showing a massing proposal for the site.As the architects describe the concepts they zoomin and out using gestures on the surface of the ta-ble. Other participants also engage and in additionto walking around the digital model scale it to focuson and discuss specific areas in the site in greater de-tail.

The architects switch between several savedvariations to discuss design alternatives. At thispoint, the climate consultants load a real time radia-tion simulation to examine the amount of solar radia-tionon the facadesof thebuildings tooptimizeorien-tation, building heights and density. They identify anareawhich seems tobeproblematic and immediatelyremove several buildings and as they have a differ-


ent idea regarding the placement of the massing inthat particular location, they take several Styrofoamblocks available, trim them to fit the shapes they en-vision andplace themon the table. The digitalmodeland the simulation results are updated in real time toreflect the changes. At this point the transportationexpert wishes to examine the distances to the loca-tion of the planned school from all of the housingblocks. She switches to that simulation and as sheis not satisfied with the results examines the effectsof moving the school to another location, reorderingsome of the buildings and roads in the process. Nowthe climate engineers run an outdoor comfort simu-lation to examine the conditions in the park next tothe newly placed school.

That iterative process continues until the ex-perts, city officials and architects are pleased withthe results. All of the participants were exposed tothe process and were able to contribute. In addi-tion the experts in different fieldswere able to gathertogether and work collectively to produce a syner-getic designwhich is optimized not just in relation totheir area of expertise but as a complex systemmain-taining a balance between many, sometimes oppos-ing, requirements. Perhaps several alternatives weresaved during the process for future reference and ascatalysts for further development. At this point thearchitects are able to proceedwith the design, know-ing that it fulfills the requirements from all of thegroups involved. There is no need for extra work tointegrate the conclusions from the meeting into thedesign as all of the work has been done on the actualmodel and the design process can continue withoutinterruptions, misinterpretations or time loss.

RelatedWorkAs buildings grow in complexity and include an ex-panding number of building related professions, sodoes the need for better tools to improve communi-cation and collaborationbetween those teams (Kalayet al. 1998). While much of the research focusedon attempts to facilitate purely digital collaborationby developing custom Information communication

technology and software as described in the liter-ary study conducted by Rahmawati et al. (2013), asecond, more physical approach advocating for endusers collaborating around a table has also been ex-plored. URP (Underkoffler and Ishii 1999) is a sys-tem for urban planning which runs simulations onphysical architectural models placed on a table sur-face, including visualizing shade for any time of day,throwing reflections off glass facade surfaces and vi-sualizing 2D windflow. BUILD-IT (Fjeld et al. 2002)an augmented reality (AR) system, loads digital 3Dmodels and allows users to select and manipulatethem by moving physical specialized bricks whichare used as interaction handlers. Offering users twoviews of the model, the top view is projected onthe table and a side view is projected on a screennearby. Arthur (Penn et al. 2004) is an augmented re-ality system which includes a head mounted displayand stereo cameras facilitating the 3D view of digi-tal models. Placeholder objects and pointing devicesare used to interact with the virtualmedia in additionto finger tracking and gesture recognition. More re-cently and with the popularization of tangible userinterface object markers , programming languagessuch as processing and parametric design environ-ments such as Rhinoceros 3D and Grasshopper3D,more direct and intuitive workflows became possi-ble. (Salim et al. 2010) describe the design and de-velopment of two such prototypes over a period offour days. Tangible markers representing buildingsare placed on a special table, tracked and update avirtual model. Participants manipulate the markerswhich triggers a real timeupdateof the virtualmodel.Viola and Roudsari (2013) propose a workflow con-sisting of an "observer" which tracks markers, an "in-terpreter" which analyses and assesses the observedmodel and a "visualizer" which displays the resultsonto a design space. Markers represent predefinedbuildings and can be freely manipulated on the de-sign space. An incoming stream within Grasshop-per3D interprets the data from the markers, recon-structs a 3D digital model, performs environmentalanalysis in near to real time and visualizes the results.


The proposed method shares many similarities withsome of the described tools but breaks free fromthe digital-physical constraints, allowing for freeform physical modeling which requires no pre-configuration, does not limit the user regarding ma-terials used in building the model, and provides ad-vanced computer simulations.

SYSTEM SETUPTo implement the mentioned approach the systemsetup includes two main parts (Figure 2):

• ADesignenvironment (Figure2 -A) calledCol-laborative Design Platform (CDP) (server ap-plication) for urban planning based on amultitouch table with additional 3D-Object recon-

struction to digitalize physical working mod-els placed on the table in real-time (Schubertet al. 2011) (Schubert et al. 2011) (Schubert2014). The platform is designed to suite theneeds of an urban planning in scale 1:500.

• Custom Grasshopper3D component (clientapplication)(Figure 2 - B) , receiving 3D infor-mation and user interactions from the designplatform. This component allowsusing the re-constructed data (geometry) from the work-ingmodels seamlessly inGrasshopper3D. Thisconnectionworks in real time andupdates au-tomatically.

Figure 2System setup: (A)Design Platform:physical modelsplaced on theDesign Platformtable (Styrofoamblocks) withintegrated 3Dobjectreconstruction, (B)CustomGrasshopper3Dcomponentrunning andvisualizingsimulations.


CDP - Collaborative Design PlatformThe technological basis for the designed develop-ment platform is a large-format multi-touch table(Figure 3 - A) with an integrated digital 3D object re-construction fun realtime realized with the help of a3D depth camera on top (Figure 3 - B).

Using semantic GIS data as its basis, a digital planis displayed on the surface of the table at a scaleof 1:500. Physical objects forming design variantscan be placed on the multi-touch table and a digitalcounterpart of them will be created automatically inreal-time - without the use of markers or any othersimilar predefined methods. Both the digital plan ofthe surroundings, aswell as the reconstructed shapesof the physical 3D objects can be seen in a perspec-tive view on another, vertical mounted touchscreen

(Figure 3 - C).This means that any physical objectsand their geometry will always have a digital equiv-alent. These counterparts are created through a cou-pled system. The footprint of the building is trackedby the surface of the table and an additional on-topmounted 3D depth camera scans the three dimen-sional shape of the object as a point cloud. Twoconstruction algorithms were conceived to assist theprocess and reconstruct the point cloud. One cap-tures the footprint of the building and extrudes it.The other records the free-form as a triangulatedmesh and connects it to the footprint. A more de-tailed examination of this process canbe found in thepaper (Schubert et al. 2013).

To support the creative design process, differentdesign approaches and the resulting use of differ-

Figure 3System setup of theCDP. A: Multitouchtable B: On-topmounted 3D depthcamera C:Perspective view ofthe design scene D:Flexible extensionvia a networkprotocol.


ent tools, the hardware and the software of the tablewere designed to be both flexible and extendable.In terms of linking hardware, this is achieved using acustom developed network protocol (Goldschwendtet al. 2014)(Figure 3 - D). The CDP serves as a server-based application and provides a client with all rel-evant design information. This includes geometricdata from digital site models, physical working mod-els and digitalised sketches. As a result external ap-plications, such as Grasshopper, can access and usethe design information in real-time.

Grasshopper componentA customcomponentwhich facilitates the communi-cation between the CDP platform and Rhinoceros3D,including Grasshopper3D and all the other stimula-tive tools previously mentioned has been conceptu-alized anddevelopedwith several key points inmind:

1. Allow for a stable and persistent connectionbetween the CDP platform and Grasshop-per. This connection first establishes a linkto the physical model and reconstructs it inGrasshopper and then ensures that any up-dates to the physical model translate in realtime to Grasshopper and in turn to any fur-ther logic which is defined. On top of cre-ating a physical input stream, the compo-nent extends upon the usual functionality ofGrasshopper by allowing for dynamically de-fined input geometry which frees the userfromconfiguring input parameters and allowsthem to focus on designing while providingconstant input from any running simulations,maintaining a feedback loop which informsthe design.

2. Accurately translate existing physical geome-try to thedigitalmodel. Rather than apositionof a generic or previously defined geometry,the actual 3D representation of the model istransmitted, processed and visualized by thecomponent. The system implementation sup-ports a wide array of physical models, rangingfrom extruded blocks (represented as planar

surfaces andheights) to free formshapes (rep-resented as triangulated meshes). This opensup an entirely new range of possibilities of in-tegrating physicalmodels in a digital platformas users are not limited to any specific geom-etry and havemuchmore design freedombe-ing able to build any shape from any materialand integrate it seamlessly into the digital set-ting. The technology is not limiting the free-dom of the design but rather adds additionallayers of information on top of it.

Figure 4The CustomGrasshopper3Dplugin, receivingand reconstructing3D information overTCP/UDP in realtime , making itavailable for furthermanipulations inGrasshopper and inRhino.

In order to accommodate for these requirements, to-gether with themotivation to keep the configurationas fast and easy to operate as possible, it was decidedto implement a single Grasshopper component. ATCP (for reliably establishing connections) and UDP(for streaming data once the connection has beenestablished) client which was described in the previ-ous section has been adjusted andmaintains the livestream between the CDP platform and Grasshopper.Anadditional programwasdeveloped inorder to cre-ate a bridge to a Grasshopper component (Figure 4)whose input parameters consist of the connectiondetails, custom configuration settings and a Booleanflag allowing to turn live streaming of data on andoff. The output parameters consist of the footprintsurfaces and heights for extrusions and mesh geom-etry for free form shapes. A distinction is made be-tween the physical and the digital geometry passedfrom theCDPplatform. Thephysicalwould often cor-relate to the actual designwhile the digital to the sur-roundings. That separation is particularly important


Figure 5A custom Solarrights envelopesimulationcomponent inGrasshoppershowing an urbancontext and a 3Dpolysurfacerepresentingmaximum heightswhich newdevelopmentshould not exceedin order to notblock direct sunaccess.

when running simulations where a clear distinctionbetween the context which is fixed and the designwhich is subject to change.

Once data is received and processed by theGrasshopper component, it is available for the vastarray of manipulations and simulations which existeither natively in Grasshopper or in custom plugins.Though most of the development focused on pro-viding a generic solution to serve as a base for otherGrasshopper definitions, several workflows, mostlyin the field of climate simulations, have been devel-oped further as test cases. These range from ratherstraightforward simulations such as shading studiesup to radiation, energy use and outdoor comfort sim-ulations. To better illustrate the proposed workflow,an implementation of a solar rights envelope simu-lation based on the method proposed by Capelutoand Shaviv (2001) which determines the maximumheight of new development in a site while preserv-ing direct sun access to surrounding buildings is pre-sented (Figure 5).

The process begins as a digital model is loaded tothe CDP platform and is extended with physical ob-jects. Once the Grasshopper plugin has been config-ured to the IP address and port of the CDP platforma live stream first constructs the combined modelin Grasshopper and then responds in real time tochanges made to the model. From this point data isavailable for further manipulations in Grasshopper.

The solar rights plugin has several inputs- the ge-ometry on which solar access is tested on, the geom-etry which potentially blocks solar access, and con-figuration settings such as grid size and sun positionstested upon. The output is a polysurface represent-ing themaximumheights of thenewbuildingswhichwould still preserve solar access to the surroundings.

The polygons of the surrounding buildings arechosen and their facades are extracted and passed tothe solar rights plugin as is thegeometry of thephysi-cal objects. The other settings are preconfigured andcan be optionally overwritten for advanced usage.Once the simulation is set to run, a polysurface ap-


pears in a certain relation to the new developmentand another component checks for an intersectionbetween the physical buildings and that polysurface.If intersections exist, meaning there is a height devi-ation, the new buildings that are harming the solaraccess rights of the existing ones are colored red, al-lowing for an intuitive way to identify the problem-atic areas. Any time thephysical objects are removed,added or moved, the simulation is re-triggered andthe results are updated in real time, creating a con-stant feedback loop which helps to inform and im-prove the design in real time.

SUMMARYThe prototype presented in this paper allows fordirect control of digital geometry in Grasshopper3D using tangible interfaces. Due to the seamlessconnection of physical models and digital content,physical models of urban design strategies can beanalyzed directly in Grasshopper. One of the no-table advantages of the proposed method relates tothe tangibles, serving not only as placeholders in aGrasshopper and a Rhino scene, but are free formphysical objects which are digitally reconstructedand allow for further analysis and simulation toolsfrom Grasshopper to be directly used in a physicalmodel. In addition parametric relationships can beprogrammed in grasshopper and be controlled bythe tangible interfaces. One of the challenges atthe moment concerns the high computation time ofsome analyzes. Furthermore, in order to accuratelyconduct some of the mentioned simulations, moredetailed informationwhich is usually not known dur-ing the early design stagesmust be supplied. Besidesurban scenarios other forms of usage for parametricdesign in Grasshopper are conceivable, as any formof placed objects on the table can be used directly asa starting point for digital manipulations.

FUTURE DEVELOPMENTOne area of further research revolves around the de-velopment and incorporation of tools to quickly eval-uate thermal and visual outdoor comfort in the pub-

lic realm. Such research will focus on simulating mi-croclimate and spatial comfort maps. An additionalarea of development concerns visualization of simu-lation results. Currently the visualized results are pre-sented on screens as perspective, side views and ajuxtaposed topview incorporating thedigital and thephysical model. As the method described in this pa-per tries to simplify the design process and make itmore intuitive and tangible, two further visualizationtechniques are being developed:

1. Projecting the results of the simulations onthe facades of the physical model in additionto the 2D visualization.

2. Incorporating augmented reality techniques.

The proposed approach opens up new possibilitiesfor the early stages of design and decision makingprocess. This is achieved by offering an intuitive andcollaborative tool with which architects, urban plan-ners, community leaders and policy makers are ableto simulate and evaluate implications of design de-cisions in the urban and neighborhood scale in theongoing attempt to create healthier, sustainable andlivable cities.

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tangible grasshopper: a method to combine physical models with generative, parametric tools

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