modeling oriental display case - help!

here's the challenge:

I've seen these display cases all over Shanghai since moving here a few months ago. I'm fascinated by the geometry, and I've been trying to model it parametrically. I think it would be great to build some contemporary furniture based on whatever logic I can find behind these shelves...

So far, however, I'm having trouble getting started. This one seems to be based on a 4x4 grid, but the lines are shifted so there are never more than 3 lines meeting at a point (i.e. only "L" and "T" connections - no "+")

I have a few ideas, which I'll post soon, but I'm curious if anyone has any thoughts on how to go about this....

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jacek Jaskólski on August 5, 2010 at 6:18pm

Hi Evan,

It's quite a riddle you've got there... here's how I see it:

analysis:

*note that the blue shelves add up to cover the width span while the red ones seem to be arbitrary additions.

reconstruction:

-take a number of evenly distributed shelves
-cut them up into random pieces
-jitter them up'n down
-create poles (bottom-up) at ends of the split segments

Looking forward to seeing your thoughts on the subject.

Best,
JJ

Permalink Reply by taz on August 5, 2010 at 8:27pm

Not to be picky (I couldn't think of anything foolproof either) but in your original analysis you neglected the one cantilever shelf (located basically right in the middle) so this condition will never be emergent in the reconstruction...

What if you randomly reduce a small percentage of the horizontal shelves?

And (being picky again) the top shelves don't always need poles...

Man this is tough.

Permalink Reply by Evan C on August 5, 2010 at 9:06pm

Ah. I had actually started in on exactly that method! But I had issues with the line-curve intersection component, and gave up for the night.

About the red shelves - they aren't arbitrary... their endpoint must align with two cut points - one from the row above, one for the row below. hmmm....

Permalink Reply by Evan C on August 6, 2010 at 12:00am

here's some progress.... the Blue shelves are split at random points, then shifted, every "cut" is reconnected. so far so good.