A Mobile Design Environment for Building Form Generation

Abstract

Computer technology has affected architectural studies as well as other professions. Architectural tools are used in every stage of the design and their primary goals are transferring and sharing the ideas of the architects’ mind. Nevertheless, in the early design phase, digital design tools remain ineffective in terms of idea development. Current design software and modeling tools are insufficient for the architect to quickly share ideas and generate alternative suggestions for fast sketching and modeling. In this paper, a mobile design application is developed. It aims to support open-ended design thinking and to be fast and effective in terms of improving ideas. It is based on augmented reality and it works on mobile phones. In order to evaluate the application, a set of images consisting of tall buildings are shown to users. Then they are asked to model a similar form of their own. At the end, results are assessed with a questionnaire. Using the obtained data, the effectiveness of the digital mobile tool in the early design stage is discussed.