Metal and Robot arm

Author: Students in seminar led by Jeremy Ficca

Project Name: Fabricating Customization Seminar

The project I admire comes from our school. It is a studio project led by Professor Ficca that experiments with the relationship between how robotic arms interact with metals to create customizable shapes generated by computers. It has the potential to renovate the means of mass-producing metal plates. The precision and rigidity of robot arms make it possible to create them. The process involves using computational design to generate different shapes of metal. Many variables control the final form, such as the panel shape, the number of folds, and the joining location. Such a degree of freedom allows for a range of unique metal forms. The students selectively choose complex shapes to produce manually and experiment with means of producing the shape. Thus, they have to understand how metals are bent to write the correct code to control the robot arms. I adore the project because it not only focuses on generating shapes but also on how to make sure those shapes can be produced physically.