Form
Isha Nadkarni
National Institute of Design, Andhra Pradesh
Industrial Design, Semester 4 ( Batch of 2022)
Course : Nature and Form
Mentor : Snehal Joshi
Before lock down, we had a two week course of NATURE and FORM, in which we had to study a natural form and also understand it. The natural form that i chose was that of Pineapple. Pineapple has many different formal aspects to it, one of them being arrangement of bracts or the ovaries of flowers that are fused to form the fruit.
At first we studied the form in 2D and then went on to make the form with wire. Wire can be considered as a 3D line , and while making these “3D sketches “ the form automatically got simplified since while making them we focused on the main attributes of the form, the things that make that form unique.
after two weeks of form, we started with SPD, in which we had a task in which we had to apply the the form of the natural object selected to the object we studied( transistor radio as mentioned in one of the previous blogs). Hence I applied the form of pineapple to a transistor radio.
Through this we understood that to change external form of a product , we need to understand the attributes of that form and also the inner workings of the selected product.
Now that we have again resumed with the form course, we warmed ourselves by sketching the the features of the natural object and minimize the lines and go to last single of the lines.
Also as a warm up we were told to sketch out some product which are inspired from the natural form.
14 July 2020
Now that we did a warm up exercise, we focused on attributes of form. When I looked at the pineapple I came up with two attributes :
- Individual units
- 5 pointed Geometry .
After we found out the attributes, I sketched the pineapple in an angle which best showed these attributes.
After I sketched it, I used a gateway sheet which helped me to abstract the above mentioned attributes in minimal lines.
But after today’s discussion with the mentor, I realized that the attributes that I mentioned above are actually the geometric part of the fruit. Then again really thought about it and then thought how does that form feel once I take the pineapple in hand. So after thinking about it hard, I came up with three key attributes :
- Uneven
- Prickly
- Dynamic
After coming up with these key words I sketched pineapple in another view that best showed these attributes.
With the help of gateway sheets I again began exploring forms that helped show the above mentioned attributes the best .
15 July 2020
After browsing through above forms Ifelt like all were a bit similar but in different ways. So I thought I could start working further on few of the forms that I felt have potential. Following are few of the explorations.
In the above explorations I tried tweaking the flow of lines and assessed the change that was brought about in the form.
In the above form even though in showed the attributes mentioned previously, i felt that it didn’t give me a “Pineapple Vibe” . So I tried to add some lines and played with the form, in the following explorations.
16 July 2020
After I did the the above explorations i wanted to see the effect of the change in the line weight of the form.I also did some solidified forms.
In the second column of the above images I thought making the above line thick would emphasize prickliness , but instead it made the form more dynamic and made the form a bit dramatic.
19 July 2020
I further wanted to explore how I could incorporate some attributes in a subtle way. So after observing the above forms i felt that the fourth form displayed all of the attributes the best. Now I wanted to make the form look a bit slow and old.
Thinking about the changes that were made and what made the form slow and old was the 2nd form in the above image. Hence i made a few variations.
I then wanted to see what if the form was broken down into basic shapes ?
After tracing out the outline of the form with basic shapes I realized that the form became very fragile and weak (old). but it did not become slow.
20 July 2020
When we ( me and my mentor ) were discussing my work, she mentioned that the very first explorations have potential to be explored as fabric print, since the pineapple are in repetitive units.
When the first unit is mirrored, and tessellated we get a complete and a regular geometry . But When only base unit is tessellated. Though the geometry is complete it forms a very different shape as compared to the base geometry of Five pointed star. Even though the geometry is lost, due the repetition and the constant tip that is facing upward retains the “ness” factor of the pineapple.
Due to the units being together and interacting with each other, eyes are getting distracted, the “ness” factor is decreased, but still some of it is retained, again because of the repetition and the tip that is pointing upwards.
The base unit when tessellated gives us a a very uniform grid.
After filling the base unit in the tessellation it added some depth in the whole tessellated pattern, which according to me brought out the illusion of uneven surface.
21 July 2020
I wanted to explore the form of pineapple in a different way. I looked at the whole form again with different views and came up with the following attributes:
- Repetitive
- Rugged
- Dynamic
I looked at the pineapple again for numerous times to see which view displayed the above attributes the best and I finalized on the front view this time including the pineapple leaves.
I further tried to simplify the forms while retaining the attributes of the pineapple that are mentioned above.
In figure 1, I tried with the linear repetition, but in the end it looked like the leaves are put on the spring and that the form is about to bounce. In figure 2 and figure 3, I tried along with the diagonally aligned units. When I observed the forms the repetition was best brought out in figure three, along with the ruggedness and dynamism due the leaves. For leaves i noticed a pattern and tried to bring out the pattern, the pattern being a leaf being attached in between the two leaves in the lower layer.
I further explored the form in figure 3.
I started with straightening the curved lines bit by bit ( Fig $4) and then i totally straightened the lines( Fig 5). In figure 5 the form retained its repetition and became more rugged and also a bit more dynamic. ruggedness was increased due to sharp lines points and straight lines. I think dynamism was brought because it feels like the leaves are bursting out which brings out more energy in the form.
In figure 6 and 7, I tried giving radius to the corners. Figure 6 still looks a bit rugged and dynamic, but it looks soft. in figure 7 I went a bit overboard with the radius and the form gives a feeling that its very fluffy and soft, it looks bouncy also. Both figures (6&7) are a bit dynamic but are not very rugged.
The above explorations are done using a single line. Below are the explorations done with solidifying the form.
In figure 8 I feel like its dynamic but not rugged, because of the curves in the leaves while in figure 9 there is some amount of ruggedness brought out because of the solidification. In figure 10 the form looks very sharp, apart from being rugged and dynamic, due the pointy tips and straight lines. In figure 11, dynamism is lost, because the form feels very static since the ‘leaves’ are very aligned and the form looks very heavy.
In figure 12 and 13 i tried simplifying the whole form into basic shapes while trying to retain the basic attributes. Figure 13, gave me a grid in the crown which i could work with, and hence i tried working with the grid in Fig 14 and 15 . In figure 14 the crown of the pineapple is pretty much evident but the body of pineapple is somewhat lost, and also looks unbalanced as if its about to topple off because of the weight of the crown. Figure 15 is quite stable i feel since it feels that the body can bear the weight of the crown.
