IT'S hard to avoid computer-generated images. We are bombarded with them by television, magazines and the internet. But turning these ideas into reality is a big challenge, says Michael Hansmeyer, a computational architect at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich.
"With all this computing power, it's been possible to create and display forms as complex as mine in virtual worlds for the last couple of years," he says. "The challenge was to find a way to get them out."
Hansmeyer designs his architectural creations with a type of iterative computer program called a subdivision algorithm. To make his design, he starts with a column. The algorithm divides the surface of the column into four smaller surfaces, which can be distorted to curve in or out, for example. This process is repeated, causing the column to be divided into ever-smaller shapes. Just 10 iterations yields over a million surfaces. ...
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