3D: Bridges

After a morning presentation concerning the versatility of the topic, we were set the task of building 5 'spanning structures'. They could be big or small, for humans or decorative, so long as they connected a point 'A' to a point 'B'.

Starting small in my sketchbook (as I wanted more evidence than photos that this days activities had occurred) I made five pop-up bridges across the pages.

This was a fun little exercise that got me thinking about both the aesthetics and the function of structures I was making.

The second part of the afternoon was spent making a bridge out of cardboard that would support a toy car driving across, and be tall enough for a table to be wheeled underneath. Thankfully we were put into teams for this task.

Using bamboo, cardboard and parcel tape, my group constructed a simple, functioning bridge.

This was a good opportunity to work in teams that we were unfamiliar with; our team was very efficient, first drawing up a plan and diagram before starting construction, then taking shifts during lunch in order to be finished with time to spare.

This was also helpful practise for thinking about supporting structures on a larger scale - we had to consider the size, shape, and weight of the car, as well as how heavy the bamboo was as part of the structure and how much cardboard could be supported by how much bamboo. 

I had to veto the use of bamboo as part of the required barriers, as I was sure that they would be too heavy for our lightweight structure. As it turned out, bamboo was entirely inecessary anyway, as the job could be done easily with the remainders of our cardboard and yet more parcel tape.

The only thing that I would perhaps have changed would be the incessant need that others felt for flinging the elastic bands around the room. That and possibly the amount of work it was to get everything cleared up afterwards.