DEV OF FORM

1981

 

 The following are  handouts provided in Strother MacMinn's Development of Form Class at Art Center College of Design during the Spring semester of 1981. Strother MacMinn was the resident master of surface development at Art Center and through the mid eighties his class was the way the torch of understanding surface development was passed to new generations of Industrial designers. In the 80's the class was required for product design majors and transportation majors.

After that time the dawn of computers, the political landscape at the college, and the professor's aging character led to these lessons becoming first minimized and then forgotten.

 Most of the sheets constitute a one week assignment . There are numerous geometry exercises for lofting developed surfaces in the assignment. 

They were provided as Black and white xerox copies and then students were tasked to get colored verithin pencils and complete the exercise using standard drafting tools of the time: a parallel bar or T- square and an adjustable triangle. 

In MacMinn's class students made a set of accelerated ships curves 

( sweeps )that had been provided by General Motors Stying to the college. The aluminum templates were traced/scribed with a plastics knife point on to 1/16th clear butyrate sheet plastic. The seven curves were cut out with the plastics knife and then each had to be sanded for hours to achieve a smooth edge that would make for great looking linework and shapes. Macminn didn't tell anyone that on the final day of class he would review of each student's work and grade the quality of the sweeps by closing his eyes and using the fingernails on his thumb and forefinger to ride the edges of the plastic curves - catching on the slightest imperfections.

 

These are sample sketches for students asked to do their own design in a similar fashion to begin a foam sanded sculpture by first making simple paper forms.  These first execises were intended to teach concepts like twisting and crowning that developed over the length of the paper surfaces. MacMinn called the foam model a directional form or accelerated form. The nickname speed form was often used by everyone else instead but MacMinn felt it missed the point of the exercise.

These are sample sketches done by a student circa 1980 for one of MacMinns assignments. The Tactile form. Students were instructed to bring in an empty  pint milk carton which was then filled with casting plaster, Students then were assigned to create a small form that was to be experienced with eyes closed and only by touch. Students were encouraged to create a sensory journey for the person experiencing the tactile form.

 

 

 

 

 

This is the handout drawing I provided as guide for students to create the same information for their clay vessels in the summer of 1990 when Joe took a sabbatical. This is identical to Joe's requirements.

This Handout provides the basic information that was required from students before they were allowed to begin construction of the 1/5th scale clay models