Open Letter to SketchUp
My objective is simple, inspire SketchUp to become PERFECT in visual design. And you know, that is a challenge, when a program is ALREADY darn close to perfection for the target function they have identified. Now I am an artist, landscape architect and programmer, so my insights are not just winging it, I have applied all these following principles when I could, and desired to find the solution, when I couldn't, or when surmountable constraints seemed to persist for years, in both the industries, their own profession, and the software emerging to bridge this gap. And I have been thinking about all this, in depth, for over 20 years, this is not a flippant wild hair, I feel it has validity and potential.
I only have positive ideas for SketchUp, and they can do what they want with this assessment.
I want to discuss the DIMENSION of "color and texture" and the landscape architect and designers obsession with the "Plan View", and why SketchUp could create a Photoshop replacement "addon", in a more thoroughly "SketchUp" "branded" manner and character, because seriously, landscape architects use less than 1% of Photoshop, when they do their final touches there, some times the whole plan graphic visuals are still done on Photoshop.
I am talking of simply adding a "hybridization" of the visual effect, and the color/texture principles, not an overcomplicated engine, because SketchUp alrady has the "engine", and they already successfully nailed the line and generic plan artistic styles. I am talking about finishing it up, for both SkecthUp and landscape architecture, in this key area of refinement to consider, and the tool to gitterdone, for the landscape architecture and landscape design, land planning market, ASAP.
That is as As SIMPLE and POWERFUL as Possible. ASAPAP, ok SkASAPAP
With the advancements SketchUp has already made in regard to visualization of concept designs for architects, landscape architects, carpentry, urban planning, garden design and similar design industries who benefit from the less realistic "non photo realistic" effect of SketchUp, it has hard to not say it is nearly perfect. No joke.
The conceptualization of adding actual artistic stroking and line work has been enough to put many architectural and landscape design renderers out of demand, as SketchUp allows anyone to depict their ideas as well represented as some of the best character sketch artists out there.
Of course an artist who employs the SketchUp tool, just increases their potential toolbox, while also saving time to be applied to design instead of traditional former techniques. Which brings up another IMPORTANT point, I am not trying to "replace humans" in design, design is FUN! Wouldn't it be nice to maximize the time we have to actually DESIGN, rather than wrangle data, and cross application constraints all the time? Geez, I am talking human designing more, and data war, and multi-tasking less. IN ONE PLACE FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE: SketchUp! LOL
Thus the line work and styles component of SketchUp is excellent. But we might as well now think more clearly about aiding the same kind of stylization, to help designers, in the areas of color and texture. Color and texture is as much its own dimension of visual design as is the "Plan View". See the plan view, is a lot of surfaces with colors and textures.
The perfect place, to apply this art. And both can use more thinking from SketchUp. At present, there is much opportunity in laying down the principles that carry these same visual benefits that SketchUp has already nailed in the line work power and stylization encapsulation.
(I discuss problems with landscape architecture, to demonstrate the market potential ironically present in those industry constraints and needs.)
1. Now I am talking now to mostly weaknesses in site design color and texture as now struggled with by some, many, landscape architects, and landscape designers, as architectural and interior color and texture is already well thought out by those more advanced industries, in comparison. Believe it or not, the principles that give uniformity and harmony to physical design, one search of "landscape illustrative plans" shows many landscape architects do not presently apply the same principles to their visual design depictions. While SketchUp has certainly helped them, 1000 times more than their own backward academic industry minds, the "color and texture department" is behind the SketchUp line work quality high bar.
And in such an OPPORTUNITY as this, the "Plan View" becomes the natural target Guinea pig, at present a multi-colored cowlick wonder of a visual hack job, a pizza with 100 ingredients. See, imagine if a designer could apply SketchUp line styles in piecemeal fashion, style 1 here, style 2 lines there, style 3 and 4 lines here, here a little, there a little, over here some more, it would soon become a visual nightmare wouldn't it?
Well, that is EXACTLY what many designers are doing with color and texture!
Now SketchUp solved the line nightmare did they not? They hit it out of the park, out of the state! And they can do the same with colors and textures, while still inspiring designers to apply their own preferences in colors and textures as part of design, but with known solid principles (like with the line stuff), and identifiable "styles" to visualize beforehand, in mind, in the same simple manner, where they still apply the elements.
In the streamlined process, certain mistakes are "coached" out by the principles and palette itself, the "ingredients" are not sky's the limit, that is when the nightmare of visual cacophony and disharmony begins. And some things can be automated. Like who wants to fill the same stuff you always fill, all the time, if there is another optional time saving method, to open more time for design detailing, right?
2. How do we also know landscape architecture is ailing visually, other than just seeing it with our own eyes by use of some Google image searches? We can see it in LandCADD by Eagle Point Software Corporation. A number of years I ago, I wanted to do a similar open letter to Eagle Point, because they were missing so much visual design aiding opportunity for landscape architects. Instead their stiff and texturally out of scale graphics, typified the main weakness in the average landscape architectural firm's site plan graphics.
Unlike Vectorworks Landmark software, which tried to aid the artistic appeal for their clientele, LandCADD was very graphically backward. And the thing is, it does not matter if it is mere line work and hatches, it can still observe visual design principles that make it work visually, even in black and white, and LandCADD fails miserably at even this, it is as if not one artist or actual designer is on staff, or was EVER consulted! It is a software anomaly! Visual Basic packaging has more art appeal than LandCADD!
Maybe LandCADD has improved some since then, I was inspired to never check back, but just search Landmark landscape design software and LandCADD, and you will SEE what I mean, when you compare the visuals of those two application approaches to visuals. See, goo visuals, also help sell the software, imo. They could have at least developed an industry highbar at LandCADD, with THEIR OWN VISUALS, rather than an erector set of 80s looking hack job visual violations, even if it is a construction aiding software! They were unappealing, right out of the box, imo.
See, had LandCADD found the happy medium, with something similar to Landmark, imo, they would be a SketchUp of landscape design software, EVEN IF it is a number and construction cruncher, no reason to leave artistic principles out of the picture, or to not verge into teaching sound principles to improve your clientele in more than just bean counting!
Well imo, SketchUp can do the same thing they have done for their vector+raster line work, to color and texture palettes to help designers create more beautiful designs in that "between the lines" area of application, which imo, can be taken to the same level as the SketchUp linework stylization concepts. It would do it in a slightly different manner of application though, imo.
So obviously SketchUp has nailed this LandCADD weakness to the wall, and provided the solution. So now we must talk about helping designers with color palettes and use of textures in the same principle of what creates harmony and visual balance, and what does not. Now we know there are thousands and thousands of textures and potential textures out there, millions in fact. See, THAT is part of the problem, like a novice cook with just too many ingredients at his disposal, we are starting to see that mishmash of unrefined color and texture work, which could be alleviated by sticking to a conceptual "palette" of acceptable visual ranges of both color and textural mix.
Now color an texture is as important in visual design as is line work and arrangement, the same principles apply to a winning Wordpress theme, as to a professional level site planning or landscape design visual. True, SketchUp has taken this forward light years, but one last step would really help. And the thing is, just as in "line work styles", the very anatomy of the "ingredients" that work, are already out there on the Web, and in nature, it can be understood, it can be sampled, it can be encapsulated for application by non-artists. You just do the same thing as with the SketchUp styles, you personalize these "branded" packages, and identify the color-textural style they are for the user, from the getgo, to start to view that dimension of visual design, in the same manner that SketchUp is teaching designers to think of their line work "styles", and to be able to customize from a benchmark that ALREADY WORKS.
So I will be addressing three areas of future development I would hope SketchUp considers, one in what I just conceptually discussed, and one in a few critical Photoshop like effects, and one more in "post production" processing, but in the model. And that with a view to the "Plan View" "final touches" and plant material and hardscape surfacing challenges of color and texture.
Now, SketchUp Styles actually relate to this overall idea. Shoot, SkecthUp is 99% already there, this is just the last 1%, so it is doable. SketchUp would benefit from being able to do what they did for "the Model", and for the "Layout", for the "Final Touches" of these visual designs, that final step, especially with a focus on the "Plan View".
This is to achieve certain obligatory, SIMPLE, Photoshop-like effects designers ALWAYS use, a sort of "Best of Photoshop-like FX", which is just a mere sampling of the entirety of Photoshop power. Which means, this could be doable, and SIMPLE, without making an overcomplicated "Bentley-like" mess. I know SketchUp loves to target simplicity and power in balance. This could do that, but with that FINAL TOUCH in mind. And the color and textures refinement, naturally leads to this final touch idea, and its main application now ailing in landscape architecture, the plan view quagmire.
Look, SketchUp is just a step or two away from visual design perfection, imo, I really have to state what I would do, if I was directing the future of SketchUp in this area of its own "final touches". (For now, lol) And it fits with the concept of Sketchucation, why stop at the software education, when the fundamental problems with color and texture are so easy to nail, once and for all, as simple as possible. This is like a hanging swaying drip, just asking to drop.
So I am not talking over complication, I am talking "Final Touches" to the overall visual, in a non-applying-to-model techniques of affecting the screen bitmap (but in any view or model orientation), so designers can tweak their design in colorization, and color balance, contrast areas, easily, as a separate or extension environment to SketchUp, to make that necessary "final touch" pass, and fully controllable output power. It is not "over complicating" things to be able to out put print ready quality resolutions folks. THAT should be a no brainer, required. And before we get there, just nailing and finishing of the color and textures palette stylization for landscape and site design graphics, without a need for any other environment, is the goal, jusy amke SketchUp perfect fro landscape architects, and it is 99% there folks, this really is a final touch. Nail those two simple refinements, and SketchUp would be PERFECT. In my opinion, of course.
And the diagnosis of landscape architecture visuals proves it is an ailment with a global market. SkecthUp becomes that Art Directors out of the Box, for non-artists, and designers in bad ruts, just finish it.
LandCADD had me thinking of approaching them with how to make their artistic appeal actually artistic. But SkecthUp has nailed that, inspired me as a designer, and so I have to approach them, with this idea. They could help landscape architects get to the next level, in also their color and texture harmony, and not as some "cookie cutter" approach, but as diverse and sky's the limit as their current styles also achieve. I mean LandCADD was so poor and backward, I lost interest in even contacting them, they fade fast in my mind. THAT is the effect visuals can have on people.
Plus I need a job, and I aint greedy, maybe SketchUp will hire me to flesh this is out for real, in the nuts and bolts of how it could be visually PERFECT, yet a true tool, yet versatile, flexible, and informative and educational to their clientele as well for inspiration and innovation. And they already have the development team, they just need to be fed new ideas. Believe me, landscape architecture in general has been in a rut for 16 years, minimum, and land planning is just as stagnant. And their "plan view" is the window into which to look to see this problem. Now I don't have time to cover the "groupthink" that infects the ASLA, but it is one of the reasons landscape architecture is nearly the best kept secret in the world, and a backward dinosaur; it all began at the top. (But I already wrote that paper, lol, so we shall move on...)
Now when we talk PRINCIPLES that make color and texture work properly, in actually a quite unique subset of design in its own right which color/texture is, we are NOT talking opinionated preference. See whether classical, blues, rap or metal, the best of those batches, all work for a set of identifiable reasons, their anatomy of sound relationships can be defined and analyzed. Same with visual design.
True, that "cookie cutter" often forms with stuff that works (just turn on your radio to hear that effect.). We are talking about WHY something works anatomically, and why something does not, AND the gradient between those two extremes, where the Avant Garde often venture, like a Dark Ages ship captain verging beyond the known charts. But that is where genius emerge, where new lands are found, and so too, new styles and trends come from this adventure in experimentation, in that gradient between what works, and what doesn't. True, that is also where some ships sink, and people disappear. So SketchUp can help navigate. So, we have plenty of examples to dissect, of both case scenarios, successes, almost theres, and failures. We can learn from this voluminous record easily viewable on-line with a little research, the best, and the worst, are all "on the Web", it is all there for the taking, and learning from, and forensics and anatomy of. CSI: Poor Visuals.
And we are NOT talking site design, that si another subject. See, even the shittiest of designs can be perfectly presented in the most beautiful form and format, even though it fails in real life. And if it is going to be a shitty design, heck, it may as well look like Michelangelo knocked it out, right? Why should the pretty girls get all the opportunities, let them all have a shot in the SketchUp world of fairness and empowerment! LOL
In reality, we critique or own work, we critique others, hopefully, to improve for the next cycle. We NEED to accept constructive criticism, for by assessing its validity, if it is present, and responding to it, we improve consistently, and the door of innovation and passion remains opened by it. So being aware of the goal of forensically identifying the KEY PRINCIPLES, FIRST, and educating and encapsulating them for people, out of the box, we can avoid jamming a preference down a person's throat, that just becomes a cliché new "cookie cutter" shape in time.
Nope, we open a "Can of Eternal Preferences Potential", totally open to the designers own tastes, new trends, innovation and new ideas and especially the "encapsulation of the solution". The style anatomy. Then they can use it, others can use it, a community forms, and it can evolve, grow and still retain its known "DNA" roots, it can understand itself, to better project its next generation. I mean cookie cutters are OK, if you have 100,000 of them, then it can spark inspiration for new stuff.
Right now, that color texture understanding, is missing in action, as far as it being as easily applied by those with no eye, just as SketchUp did for 3D design graphics.
The goal is to NOT imprison people, just because they are not an artist, but to create the next level of a tool that EMPOWERS them to be a freakin' Rembrandt in design, by APPLYING his principles, as easily as following a chili recipe. EASIER, because SketchUp can provide the bags of chili, that already works! It becomes as easy as pouring it into the meat, for non-artists, to be artistically empowered. This is not rocket science or a mission to moon folks. It just needs to be fully addressed by a serious group, with a serious vision, and SketchUp team seems to be that group!
We do NOT want to lose the passion for what we do, no matter what it is we do, it is all hybridizing, and one area of a jolt of inspiration or innovation, like tazing a human chain, now affects other industries. Other industries have gotten re-excited about design, because SketchUp was excited about what they do, and their vision.
When a tool constrains a user, it is not really a tool, it is handcuffs, a "tool" of restraint. When a tool opens the imagination, and ENGAGES the creativity of the user, sparking it to new levels and educates the user by "encapsulated example", to better apply THEIR OWN IDEAS, while teaching and staying in known SIMPLE principles that work, then the tool exponentiates inspiration and creativity, people love using it, it expands their mind, they buy it, they apply it, IT AFFECTS THEIR INDUSTRY POSITIVELY! It keeps expanding, it becomes revolutionary. And when many Web apps, and Photoshop, and a thousand other programs ALREADY have the ideas, to form a "wish SketchUp" did this list, CERTAIN KEY FUNCTIONALITY, can open new market potential, and the gradient of simple to powerful balance can still be maintained.
It is all already out there! And SketchUp ALREADY has the wheel in 99% form, and a ton of capable mechanics in the pit! It is time to simply put the pedal, to the metal.
In core truth, SketchUp is ALREADY that, these are just final touches I have been considering telling them they may consider, they can apply the ideas however they want, this end is free. And the beauty of it is, it does not constrain, it founds a foundation of principles, and examples, and encapsulated "learn by example" that expands creativity, which expands use, which naturally innovates as this inspiration is amplified, which positively affects the whole of BOTH industries here.
It opens what is in my opinion a high ROI new focus on landscape architecture, which has many "three legged gazelles", the SketchUp Lion could "solve" once and for all time, as well as allowing the support developers in the "Pride", to also continue to create those things that would be considered overkill, to also continue to finish of the ailments of landscape architecture, and prime profession of a herd of three legged Wildebeests, just asking to be finished off.
Why would SketchUp pass up an industry with identifiable core constraints, ascertainable with just a couple days of Google, when at the sale this industry is at, and see it could also be profitable? This si why I wondered why software places, did not also attack the actual things they clients are doing, less efficiently, when it could advance both industries at the same time? But now I am verging into that zone Autodesk shrapnel of programs has already demonstrated. They might as well also be an architecture and engineering firm out the back door, but I aint going here any more, I promise!
Might as well think big though! It is not going to stop anyways, on the computer science end, is it? Then might as well face the new landscape architecture "landscape" while we celebrate what SketchUp has already done, but why not expand as well? Is there really anything wrong with making innovation a CONSTANT REQUIRED GOAL? No, because in this symbiosis, BOTH industries advance in positive ways, we are not replacing people, we are empowering ANYONE to be able to compete with old and tried lions of the past, who are now lumbering bronties; it is what it is, it is where it is going anyway.
SOMEONE is going to do it, the worse things get in this terminal disease infecting landscape architecture the more they will have to invest in this direction, and the more logic there is for SketchUp, to consider being that final frontier spearhead, applying art in principles that work, as a thing which is prime for a an art renaissance revolution.
I have been sitting by, watching landscape architecture continue to devolve and be a background myth, and now I am saying why, in part, and why a SketchUp can revolutionize this final "sticking point" and the logic they ALREADY have 99% of the wheel, they just need to consider rolling it over this current road kill called landscape architectural visuals.
It would put the industry out of its misery, but ironically, in a good way, revivifying its outlook, helping it where it needs it, in the direction is it going, and partnering with SketchUp to be the "expert in a box" in this regard. True, many would ignore it, but the next would not, it would be for them.
And in all honesty, As Photoshop was one of these wonder tools, they too have only taken it so far, it too can encapsulate visual success more fully, while not constraining the designer, but opening up her mind to the principles of why documenting these things, is how a foundation of innovations is built. Yet, Photoshop is an untapped treasure trove of nuggets to think about.
The problem is, them thousands of third party tools, as great as they are, is as scattered as a kitchen after a tornado and earthquake, SketchUp needs to "brand" a core set of needed functionality, landscape architecture needs guides, they have been wasting the last 20 years, by wasting time doing it wrong, and now it is consuming the industry in lost time, and it aint getting better, everyday it is sinking, as fast as technology outstrips them. Like a buffalo up to his nose in quicksand, bubbling under, thrashing but getting nowhere, SketchUp can throw out the rope, lasso the poor beast, and tow it out with the Humvie of innovation.
Now Autodesk did decide to start to target beyond generic use of their tool. BUT, like a gradient between what works, and what does not, there can also be a gradient between intuitive simplicity, and an overcomplicated trip to Mars program overkill. (You know, like Microstation, LOL. But, if that is their goal, they nailed it, more power to them!)
Believe it or not, in many landscape architecture firms, they have no encapsulation practice, and no real innovation goal. Oh, its a great buzzword in team meetings, but its all talk, no walk, and their is a core REASON why. Like a person with long term memory loss, some of these firms work in a perpetual now, where little persists but the 1980 business model, nothing is recorded, people come and go like waves on the beach, and only broken legacy, endless struggles with data, visuals and computers is a constant, everything built is washed away the next year, like a sand castle, year over year over year, for the last 20.
Like Red's Pacific Ocean in Shawshank Redemption, Landscape Architecture has no memory, like the Strawman of Oz, we question if it has a brain as well. But there is a market, in this memory and brain demand, it can be restored. THAT is the truth about the "modern" landscape architecture "model", it is a big fossil, and ROI drain, in its bell curve midsection. Its job security is billing wasted time, it has backward academics, it has resisted innovation and computing like the plague. And I blame myself, no one up and told these guys in time, and when they did it fell on novice weekday golfers and deaf ears, who that the end all Shangri-La had been reached in 1984. It's halftime in this super bowl, but landscape architecture drank a case of its own champagne at half time, passed out now.
And now, it is prime for a life preserver, at least for one of is drowning mates. Just sit tight back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of landscape architecture's fateful trip...
The core cause, or lack of cause, is no excitement for the new tools and new paradigm, and that by the reason of lack of understanding, and always thinking the next ten years, will just be a repeat of the last ten years. Well in reality, in the last 20 years, EVERYTHING has changed! And 20 years ago, you have landscape architecture academics who avoided the computer for 10 years, in lieu of their tenured campus moon walk. That was the root phase.
And now the dinosaur MUST adapt, or you know, this is not a joke. Thus no investment in time, learning, and resources, and no ROI, means? Only more stagnation. Now true not all landscape architecture firms are these kinds of bronties, but the "fat of that bell curve" is folks, it is what it is. And there is your future market, SketchUp, for this ailing niche.
They are stuck, don't but the bluster, it is just buffalo bellows of a stuck beast. Now our new generation "velociraptors", will be applying this stuff, no arm twist needing, and they will show the benefits in increased and better process speed, accuracy and efficiency. It is not all bronties, yes, their is a new age predator, the young landscape architect. They can be advanced by SketchUp encapsulating the antidote and how to administer it, for them, for an updated business model. (But that too, is another article, back on subject...)
SketchUp has done these things a super tool does, imo, it is revolutionary, and now we can discuss how to finish this area between the lines, in color and texture principles, and in thought to also targeting areas that now employ Photoshop for these final touches, and that is the "Plan View", my final point of the convergent point of all this talk. And this is in general, and in the specifics, of landscape architecture I have addressed.
The "Plan"
While it is great to have perspectives and 3D design and modeling functionality, landscape architects and planners just love that view they would get as if they were a bird flying over their pretty little design! We all like to fly, even if through vicarious symbology, that God's eye view. Maybe that is the draw of it all. But anyway, just like color and texture, "The Plan View" is its own dimension of design , believe it or not, when it comes to designers since before the days of Versailles and Vaux Le Vicomte.
Now we know "face me" slices of trees don't work in plan view, shadows yes, volume no, but there are many possible solutions and workarounds. But the plan view, to some landscape architects, is like 80% of the excitement of the job, maybe more! So I think discussing it, with the idea of full power as SketchUp already likes to do, is the natural place these ideas are converging. It is the plan view that shows were work is needed in the landscape architecture industry, and where I believe they would really use a tool with SketchUp talent for nailing problems to the wall, if this was provided, the "Super Plan View" tool, with that "Final Touches" application of encapsulated artist DNA, but digital.
STOP! I know what you may be thinking.
Nope, this is not reinventing some wheel, it is merely assisting designers to apply principles and techniques to achieve the effect they now rely on Photoshop to achieve, and when in there they just use 1% of that program, the 1% they need. You know a Landscape Architect version of Photoshop would be like 5 megabyte, like 10 commands, if that! I just think SketchUp could nail that 1%, in a plan view generator, that simply gives Photoshop a total run for its money. NO JOKE!
And creating the "workaround", the "magic" for that 1%, in SketchUp, is something their top notch development team could have rough ideas and pseudo functioning test utilities, in a week, per target objective. It is not over complicating the thing, it is just taking that 1% "Photoshop Tweaks", and just applying it to the rasterized veneer, not a Photoshop engineering, SketchUp already has all the engine and objects accessible. The idea, is often what comes last. It is basically pulling users out of Photoshop (especially landscape architects), and into SketchUp for also that Final Touches round. And better than that, being a doctor of visual design to get landscape architects over certain hurdles with encapsulated solutions, OUT OF THE BOX, an office in an app, on a laptop is what it boils down to.
We don't need no stinking conference room and kitchen nook of gossip! LOL
We need to nail final visual constraints in landscape architecture, FOR GOOD, and nail the final touches in SketchUp for this focus, AT THE SAME TIME, and make a final touch tool that draws landscape architects and other plan view desiring design professionals, into SketchUp to take that already awesome top of the mountain program, into FLIGHT! Let's finish this war with visual imperfection!
To tell you the truth I would do the next step for free, just to see this monster put down for good in this industry by SketchUp, that is the truth! Being in the landscape architecture trenches for 30 years, is why I know what I have covered, is not fictional, it is the reality of many firms in this industry, TODAY. It is really prime for new thinking. I mean like the messenger with the bad news, landscape architecture's "movers and shakers" have killed many messengers over the years, burying new ideas is their second profession.
Just saying, a fresh outlook would be well received by those in landscape architecture waiting for new ideas, and I believe SketchUp could tap that market, begging for the solution, whether it knows it or not, and we have a younger smarter generation on the way.
Unique Vision
Now the reason why I have this unique perspective, a "SketchUp Eye's" view into the landscape architecture "business model" is because I was a production monster, with an eye on constant software application, automation, and a hand artistry rare in the field in this combination, which incidentally SketchUp also helped in my case, in that direction. I programmed my self out of a job, I was the "critic who is too negative", but they did not retain the knowledge base when I left, they devolved the very next day, into that 1980s rut, like water off a duck. And today, NOTHING has changed, I assure you, not one thing.
I have seen the chasm of lack of understanding between HOW landscape presentation and construction documents are created, and how little management comprehends the very basics of these now almost 100% digital processes. It is now the Grand Canyon folks, And I was in it from before the days Windows ran in Excel, Micrografix Picture Publisher had "layers" while Photoshop had not implemented that functionality yet, and you had to pirate AutoCAD, buy your own computer, and buy scanners for 1000 dollars if they were any good.
I have SEEN with my own eyes, landscape architecture firms, resist technology, offset material investment in their businesses to advanced tech-hungry production grunts, only doing it when it was totally necessary. And that stunted growth, is why landscape architecture is as backward as it is today. I have seen 5000 plant field inventory "managers" opt for 10 extra minute post field GPS processing, per plant, because they did not want to take an extra 30 seconds at each plant to pull in a 5 character field comment, that could have driven both the AutoCAD attribute data, and the Excel table, from the same text string, by programmatic means. Something doable on a 150 dollar Gamin GPS.
Instead they bridged the data gap, by human means, manually, because they did not want to adjust something that could be proven to be 10 times and more faster, and more accurate, in translation. I have witnesses this 10 years ago, and can tell you that backward firm STILL does it like that. They think because GPS points are distributed in AutoCAD, they have climbed mount Everest, but still manually place populated attribute blocks, on those points, and mine out data manually for tables, STILL. Minutes per plant, rather than 2 seconds.
I have seen places with 70 and 100 acres of plant natural revegetation planting plans, that had to place every plant in the plant palette mix, calculating ratio every 1/2 acre, manually doing the math, manually mining table data, one plant at a time planted, when they could have a random plant distribution program, disperse exact ratios of plants, tabulate it all in the drawing and Excel, AUTOMATICALLY, in less than 15 minutes, in total, or in design areas. It was going in in natural distribution anyways, why take all week, for something that is 15 minutes with a custom SIMPLE app?
I have seen this, I developed these programs, and that is how I could develop programs full time, while still getting the work done, many times faster, while still getting paid, and not stealing from the firm, all week long, for 15 years, and STILL, not one form, would implement the innovations as documented policy!!!! They are the ones who chose the old way, to bill clients for this lack of efficiency. In every landscape design process in this field, I had developed tools that let me complete by Tuesday, what the boss thought would break my butt getting it in by Friday. I just got more time to develop and research. And they would NOT respond to the proven technology, they could not wrap their minds around these "miracles". In fact, it was "threatening" to some.
Now when you have a 20,000 acre land use plan, 10 schools, 15 parks, 100,000 lots, etc, (the second largest in the country at the time), and you need to design and crunch polygon data and lotting data that would take three people all week, all night, with one person in two days, then I did have a supervisor who did "see the light" on automation, and I made him a lot of money, because I billed it as if it was three people, all week, all night, and he was cool with it, that was the way landscape architecture responds to new technology. That was a forward thinker in this industry.
Now I am not insulting or accusing this man, I LOVED the guy, he was open minded, and paid well and gave you a flexible schedule to "gitterdone", just saying landscape and planning have NOT thought of the implications of greatly disruptive and acceleratable technology, and applying it properly. Not one thought folks.
And thus they have not thought about how they can get more work, by doing it faster, and adjusting their marketing and billing methods to respond correctly, while passing savings on to clients, while still making good profit, and while being able to do more projects, faster and better. See, when a place actually profits from inefficiency, they will produce more. Landscape architecture has not the pulse on their own business processes, no tracking of real performance is system OR personnel, and why? They make money off of slow slogging old world rip off of clients. They have not figured out, how to make "Business @The Speed of Light" pay, yet.
Folks, it is THAT stalled, I kid you not.
(And I am not just saying these things, I have documented the case studies, and have the programs and code to demonstrate it, and no, Autodesk is not out to undercut their third party developers, you will NOT see that stuff in even AutoCAD 2020. NOTHING, overall has changed in Landscape and planning, and AutoCAD 2000 was the watershed, 10 years of AutoCAD has not come close to what I had built and was using in AutoCAD 14.02, with VB and VBA. And they are not going to, their desktops solve only so much of the general problems in this industry, they don't want you so high, you never need another shot.)
I have seen 5 firms, in 3 states, from 2 man partnerships, to 100 person multi-disciplinary engineering firms, IGNORE this kind of technology, for 20 years solid, resist it, and even fire you for pushing it! And that is why I know that "sampling" is a typical of this industry, I did not "hit the lottery", it is the same in Florida, New York, or New Mexico, in general. (Because they have the same backward ASLA driven loafers as an academic guiding root)
And that is why the younger generation may be able to be more fully convinced of why embracing emergent technology fully, has its benefits, and starts with the basics of anatomizing the production processes to the hilt. If they do not understand how production gets it done, they cannot see when an innovation is valid, and that is why landscape architecture is a brain dead, innovation-less money sucking pit. But the market will demand it in time, technology demands it, and a major global "ecological economic event" will prove this, in the future.
So it is not for no reason I see SketchUp as an avenue of maybe more open mindedness, and why what I say about landscape architecture is true, it has cash-cow potential too, not askign SketchUp top be a charity for us LAR dolts. I have seen it, I know why, from root, to current cancer. There should not be a law against doing things better. And if I went through planting design, irrigation, specs, cost estimating, presentation graphics, and dead-pan Web marketing retardation, this could be 10 more pages, that is how bad things are that I have witnessed and been part of in landscape architecture. It is client rip-off architecture is what it is.
Whoa Nelly! Back up... Might as well try to nail the Plan graphics thing, may there be a silver lining to the cloud hanging over Lar.
SketchUp has it 99% done, just a couple tweaks. And maybe while doing that, they may more seriously consider just how prime landscape architecture is for another wave of software overhaul, and that some will respond to it, and many will have to, and it can pay for both parties to respond. True, this is no charity. Now one of the main impediments is terminal denial, and lack of admission, in landscape architecture. These guys are not rocket scientists, we admit that, but that does not mean easily solvable problems do not exist, and knowledge of them can benefit the "next solution" engineers, such as SketchUp, just wanted this perspective to be known.
When I say landscape architecture can be optimized, I mean they are at the bottom of the hill, the sky is truly the limit as far as potential, once they see the light, and some will see that light. And believe me, Civil engineers are in the same boat, maybe worse.
Them guys with the ties couldn't tell you how to lost an AutoCAD entity, AutoCAD guys do almost all the actual Civil work now-a-days. The entire business model of landscape architecture, is about to be put to the final test. At this time ASLA is no solution, but the root of the stall. No one can set the record straight, though, they get fired, but now the pie is headed to their face, it was valid warnings.
Maybe SketchUp can aid some friendly whipped cream to the coming projectile. I mean, its not the end of the world, to do it right, right?
Now I have not gotten into principles that work, and tool concepts to migrate from Photoshop dependence, but it is up in here, that can also be demonstrated by seeing it, and napkin sketching solutions.
Regards
Mark
Statistics: Posted by Marthmatica — Wed Feb 17, 2016 4:20 am