176 - Y2K, DEFCON Levels, and Zaha

DEFCON Levels and Zaha Hadid: A Nostalgic Dive into Architecture

In this episode of the Coffee Sketch Podcast, Jimmy and Kurt introduce a new DEFCON segment, reminiscing about Y2K, and discussing the art and architecture of Zaha Hadid. They explore the Millennium Dome's controversial legacy and dive into AI-enhanced sketches, juxtaposing traditional and modern architectural techniques. The conversation meanders through topics such as teaching, design iterations, and the influence of past projects on future work, all sprinkled with lighthearted banter and pop culture references.

00:00 Introduction and New Podcast Feature
01:27 Defcon Levels Explained
03:16 Welcome to the Coffee Sketch Podcast
04:27 Pie Day and Fundraising
12:10 Sketch Collaboration and Y2K Memories
16:44 Boomer Prepping and Prince's 1999
19:01 Millennium Dome and Richard Rogers
20:34 Zaha Hadid's Influence and Mind Zone Pavilion
22:44 Teaching Architecture and Student Inspirations
34:49 AI Sketches and Surprising Results

Transcript

Kurt Neiswender: 0:32

Oh, well. Hey, Jimmy. Hi. How are you doing? How's your Defcon?

Jamie: 0:36

Well, so yeah, so we're gonna add a new feature to the podcast folks, and we're going to, we're gonna start each episode with our, our DEFCON level. So and so we have confirmed, you know, that I might have been right, Kurt was a little bit suspicious about it. He's throwing up some hand gestures, not ones that you're thinking about as hand gestures. Our, our hand gestures that we use to like, just explain things to one another on screen, sign language, coffee, sketch language, healthy podcast. You know, it's like a banter. We might have,

Kurt Neiswender: 1:11

remember when we did this without video?

Jamie: 1:14

I don't know how we did, but it was like, at that point it was telepathy.

Kurt Neiswender: 1:18

It was, it was a lot of, a lot of mind, mind games. Mind control. Yeah. So

Jamie: 1:24

so we're gonna start each episode. So for the, for the folks who are joining us for the first time this is the Coffee Sketch podcast. We do talk about art, architecture popular culture, our daily lives, a little bit of update and of course the coffee. Teaching, teaching, teaching things. Yeah. Yeah. Learning. Learning stuff. Math, sometimes maybe math, maybe a little bit of ai, you know, we'll get into Little Tech stuff today. But we're gonna add a new segment. Just'cause of the, you know, I don't know. It just feels right. Yeah, just feels right. It's 2025. It feels right. Don't just say, we'll leave it there. So, so con is sort of the US military readiness, right? So they use that like, if you remember like, as a, as like an eighties child, like, you know, the movie war games Yeah. Matthew Broderick's maybe one of his best films ever. Right. War games. Like with Whopper. Do you remember Whopper? Like, whoa, Cormick is like, mine just went at this point. Whopper. It does sound familiar. Yeah. So Whopper was the, the supercomputer that he had to like, right. Play, play the game against, right. Do you want to play a game? Right. So Defcon is the military readiness level, you know, so we normally don't worry about this, but you know, maybe So so Defcon five is kind of like, you know, it's all good, you know, it's like green pastures and blue clouds and puffy stuff. Blue, you know, the whole loose guy with puffy clouds. There you go. That one. A few white clouds. Yeah. Jamie's drawing lines. And there's little squiggles and, you know, there's lines, yeah. Lines with s you know, run it through that AI and it's, everybody's happy. It's all smiley faces. Yeah.

Kurt Neiswender: 3:09

Oh, I see, I see where you're going with this. Yeah. The sketches might be different levels of Defcon.

Jamie: 3:15

Yeah. So there's Defcon five, right. And we're, we're kind of all good, right? We're sipping the tea, you know, we're, we're not even drinking the coffee'cause like, who wants to pollute their body with the caffeine? Right. We're just and then, and Defcon one is like. Joystick in hand, and we're diving into the depths of the ocean and the, the craft is really probably collapsing in on us. So if you see us do this on the screen, maybe means something.

Kurt Neiswender: 3:44

War games.

Jamie: 3:45

War games. Yeah. It's war games, you know, Atari, Atari, joystick in hand. So all that to say is welcome to the show.

Kurt Neiswender: 3:52

Yep. Welcome to the Coffee Ski podcast. The only, only live streamed architecture and design podcast that talks about coffee and all those things. And Defcon live streamed on YouTube and Twitch.

Jamie: 4:08

Just workshopping that Defcon thing. Yeah,

Kurt Neiswender: 4:11

yeah, yeah. We gotta have something, something. It's, it seems, seems appropriate. You know, we,

Jamie: 4:15

we learned that some podcasts, they like to have lists. Yeah. They also like to have names for their segments, neither of which we've really ever done with any consistency. We have segments. We have segments. We know that. But it's all here. It's all

Kurt Neiswender: 4:31

telepathy. Yeah. So what's in your Defcon cup?

Jamie: 4:37

I had to go to the Grackle. Oh yeah.

Kurt Neiswender: 4:40

Good, good. Switch. Nice pivot. As they say. Pivot. So, grackle It is

Jamie: 4:47

grackle It is just the Where's my grackle? Standby. I know. I, Hey, hey. I, I know, I mean, you got, you got, you had a pie in your face.

Kurt Neiswender: 4:56

Oh, we didn't talk about, well, we were talking about that in the in the. Well, we have some photo evidence of, of pie day,

Jamie: 5:04

but yeah, I'm not trying to give away any secrets here, folks. We will talk about the pie, but you had a pie in your face that has given me extra impulse to get that care package in the mail

Kurt Neiswender: 5:17

Pie on my face. Yeah, so well that What about yourself? No pressure.

Jamie: 5:21

No pressure. What? What you drinking?

Kurt Neiswender: 5:22

I am still working, working through the coffee sketch. Our own coffee, our coffee sketch podcast. Coffee from Rootless. So, you know, get the French press, get the grind, the beans, you know, put it together. My French presses don't seem to last too long. I,

Jamie: 5:42

well, you gotta keep all the parts, parts. You gotta keep all the parts. Don't, don't, don't throw them in track parts,

Kurt Neiswender: 5:49

but they're, the parts are. I had to, I had to rebuy. What was the part that I, oh, the, the other, oh God. Anyway, that was my arrow press. I, it's now it's re it's reconstituted, it's complete again, it's a whole, the whole object. So, yep. The rootless coffee sketch blend, which I, you know, I, I've always wanted to like make little giveaway bags sizes, right. But that would mean I would've to open up and then like repackaged. And then I feel weird about like handing people repackaged, you know what I mean?

Jamie: 6:25

Well, yeah. I mean, it'd be like at Halloween, like, like where like, like you come home and mom and dad are like, I'm not put laser blades in it. Mom and dad are like, Uhuh. No. Popcorn ball you, like, you throw all that stuff on the, on the carpet in the, in the living room, and you're like sorting stuff with your friends and you're like, oh yeah, I like this. And Oh, you're trading for that. And then mom like hovers over and goes, yeah, that you're not No, that's

Kurt Neiswender: 6:51

the

Jamie: 6:51

popcorn ball that's going right in the trash. That was that one house.

Kurt Neiswender: 6:55

The Defcon Defcon three. Yeah. Yeah. So I, that's why I memories of yeah, safety, safety measures keep me from doing that. But we gotta figure out something for, you know, the conference, you

Jamie: 7:08

know. Well, we've got a lot of ideas. We have, like if we had, if we had a vision board, if we were, if we were born about 10 years later than we were. Then we would feel compelled to do vision boards. Right? I mean, like, I would like be right in our wheelhouse. Oh yeah. Just, you know,

Kurt Neiswender: 7:26

they say it's a millennial thing,

Jamie: 7:28

so Yeah. But it's, you know, we're not, we understand what they are. We appreciate factors and the essence of it. So yes, we, we do have some ideas. Well

Kurt Neiswender: 7:39

brainstorms Yeah. Can exist on whiteboards. Right. I keep pointing over the wrong shoulder.

Jamie: 7:45

Well, I know, like you've moved a couple times, you haven't reassembled your crazy board with all the string and all the yarn. Yeah. I'm a little disappointed. But we'll get you there. Yeah. See it's just, it looks like, it looks kind of nice and fresh.

Kurt Neiswender: 8:00

The fresh wall. Mm-hmm. So. So pie. Let's, well, okay, so we, we'll, we can flash the screen for the sketches, but start over here with the evidence of the pie face. I got pied in celebration of pie day 3.14 1 5 9, 1 5, 9 something, something. Numbers. There's me and my Lawrence Tech Coad shirt, you know, was representing our department and for a fundraiser. Good. Cause the, the architectural engineering students are in a finals for a design competition and they, they're trying to fund their way to Kansas City. So I said, I'll, I volunteer as tribute. To, to get, take, take one for the team. And I took four for the team. At least four pies.

Jamie: 8:54

At least four that you remember. Like it started to get, I remember sort of blurry.

Kurt Neiswender: 8:58

Yeah. It's, it's it's all still still on. Did you have

Jamie: 9:01

goggles on? Like what did they have? Like, is it I did,

Kurt Neiswender: 9:03

I did bring some eye protection.

Jamie: 9:06

Okay.

Kurt Neiswender: 9:06

Some, some, you know, some, you know, the things you, your Home Depot glasses, you know, or, you know, simple eye protection. You know, safety first. Right? It's important. It's important. Keep it Defcon five.

Jamie: 9:20

Now as we're looking at this, I see a lot of like that visqueen barrier behind you and like the chairs and like, and the lady next to you, like has like a hair net. Yeah. So,

Kurt Neiswender: 9:33

you know,

Jamie: 9:34

have you seen this is, this is the audible portion. Like, not audible, like I'm speaking, but audible. Like, let's football, let's call an audible. So pivot, switch. We're pivoting. Yeah. See, I didn't even see, I, I'm not even using the architecture jargon. Right. I'm just going, I'm going straight to the sports jargon because this is the sports thing. Have you seen the Dukes Mayo Bowl?

Kurt Neiswender: 9:58

Yeah. I don't know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Would you do that? Where do they Yeah, where they dump. Dump all the mayo on you.

Jamie: 10:06

On the winning coach. Yeah. The winning coats Gross gets like a Mayo bath.

Kurt Neiswender: 10:11

I know, I know. Well, you know it's marketing,

Jamie: 10:15

right? It's marketing. It's that time of year when like you're, you're at home and you're like, the TV's just sort of on and like the family's doing stuff and you're prepping this and that and whatever. And if the Duke's mailbox bows on, I have to say folks, it. You don't even need to watch the game. Like it's, it's like the end with the whole Mayo Bath. Quite a spectacle. The announcers during the course of the broadcast will try different versions of whatever the crazy demons that Duke's make up as like pseudo like product testing. And so they'll, like, there's some, there's some weird stuff that they eat, I will say. And oh I missed all this year all the way through the broadcast not to be outdone by the Pop-Tart

Kurt Neiswender: 11:06

bowl. Yeah. Then there's the Cheez-Its too,

Jamie: 11:09

yeah. But the pop, but the Pop-Tart one, there's a, there's a, they, they, they put the, they put the pop, they put the live Pop-Tart mascot in a toaster. And then it comes out the bottom. And then the players who win the game get to eat the Pop-Tart

Kurt Neiswender: 11:24

will cannibalism, they pick up

Jamie: 11:25

next, it's like cannibalism at the end of the football match. So the Cheezit, I don't know Cheez-It

Kurt Neiswender: 11:29

one though. I think they fill the trophy full of Cheez-Its, see, I love a Cheez-It, so I like Cheez-Its,

Jamie: 11:36

yeah, yeah.

Kurt Neiswender: 11:37

The extra burned ones, you know, the toaster, well that's

Jamie: 11:40

the Poptart Bowl. Right. So like, and you know, the, the, you know, that mascot looked a little frightened going into the thing and doing the,

Kurt Neiswender: 11:48

well, it's a, it's kind of like like a near-death experience.

Jamie: 11:52

I think so. I think so. So you don't, you know, did you have that with the pie in your face? Did you have a near-death experience?

Kurt Neiswender: 11:58

Nah, no. They, the students were quite, quite gentle. They didn't wanna. They didn't wanna slam the pie, so it wasn't very messy, all, all in, but it was a good cause.

Jamie: 12:10

Not like a good casone over the top of your head. Cascar.

Kurt Neiswender: 12:13

What is a casone?

Jamie: 12:15

You don't like the, I don't know if the eggs know that one. Eggs with confetti in them. Oh, and they just smash the egg on your head?

Kurt Neiswender: 12:23

Yeah.

Jamie: 12:23

Okay.

Kurt Neiswender: 12:24

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jamie: 12:25

I get it. Young children, to their delight, get to do that to their parents. It's, it's amazing. I

Kurt Neiswender: 12:30

don't, I don't, I mean, I haven't, that's a long time ago. Yeah. I, Casca road. No, no glitter. That would draw suspicion, I think, you know. Anyway.

Jamie: 12:41

Next year. Next year.

Kurt Neiswender: 12:43

So while we're looking at the, the pictures, I guess I'm, I'm pivoting, making a pivot. Ooh. To the sketch. And we did a little, we did a little collaboration, I think this week. Sketch ai. Oh, right, yes, yes, yes. Let's get this caption out of the way, you know,'cause that's interfering with the view. There we go. So Casone aside, so, so Jamie brought back something, something I hadn't, I had not thought about in a long time, but I used to, I used to stare at like books, you know, monographs and stuff and, you know, things that had this project in it, you know, long before the internet. Well, not the internet, but, you know, availability of Google image search and, and so on. It might've

Jamie: 13:31

been dial up is what he's saying. It's might, it might've been dial up.

Kurt Neiswender: 13:34

So getting the book in the library was easier. But this is funny when you said, you called it Zaha and then I saw the, the human, you know, human figure, and I was like, oh, I know exactly what that is. Was, so it's, and, but I forgot the name. So you reminded me is the Mind zone, Zaha Mind Zone project, which was in the Millennium Dome in London in, well, 2000, right, right. It was a,

Jamie: 14:00

yeah. Designed for the, yeah, designed for the third Millennium celebration. Y 2K folks. Yeah.

Kurt Neiswender: 14:07

Y 2K, you know. Okay. So just for the perspective, Jamie, most of the students that I teach right now, were born after Y 2K. I realize this, which. It means they don't know what the Y 2K bug.

Jamie: 14:21

I know, but there's a movie, I think there's a movie coming out right now that's like going back in the time machine. Is it? It's like, I think it's like a horror spoof ish thing. It might have already come out.

Kurt Neiswender: 14:35

Oh, I saw the, I think I know what you're, I saw a trailer, I saw the

Jamie: 14:37

trailer for it and I was like, why is this speaking to me? Like, maybe because I lived, I wanna watch that too.

Kurt Neiswender: 14:44

Maybe

Jamie: 14:44

because I lived through that bizarre moment.

Kurt Neiswender: 14:47

You know what, you know, the panic that the, the panic and the subtle pandemonium that the Y 2K glitch potential caused. If, if that's the only thing we had to worry about now in Y 2K 25.

Jamie: 15:04

Yeah.

Kurt Neiswender: 15:05

I, I would be happy. Way more chill. It'd

Jamie: 15:09

be like DEFCON five. Yep.

Kurt Neiswender: 15:11

It'd be just down at Defcon five. Yeah. Right now we're nearing Defcon two to one, DEFCON two.

Jamie: 15:18

I think we're, I think, I think we're two. May, maybe three. Like, do we be optimistic and say three y 2K or do you wanna say two?

Kurt Neiswender: 15:24

Let's do, we'll do three. We'll, okay. We'll do three. We'll start at three.

Jamie: 15:26

Three this week. We'll start at three this week.

Kurt Neiswender: 15:28

Yeah.

Jamie: 15:29

It's a new segment.

Kurt Neiswender: 15:30

It depends on how our brackets shake out. Yeah, I know. Well, gosh, right?

Jamie: 15:33

March Madness.

Kurt Neiswender: 15:35

So Y 2K, the year 2000 had lots of optimism and healthy doses of fear, you know, the clocks. What was the result of the So everyone was worried for those that are too young to remember. The, the big fear was that the. Our computers would not be able to handle the clock rolling over from 1999 to 2000, or all computers, I guess. And then banks were really worried, right, because ooh, it's gonna screw up their records and then, you know, people's money and, right. And then, but then, you know, 2000 happened, you know, the, the new year and people, nothing, nothing. Nothing was the problem. The computer figured out how to make 2000. Right,

Jamie: 16:24

right.

Kurt Neiswender: 16:24

They didn't even have to fix anything, I don't think. Well, no, I

Jamie: 16:27

mean, it, it, you know, it just, it just was, I mean, think, think, think about, think about this, like from a, like let's zoom back out, like, and, you know, and, and the ridiculousness of it to some degree, right? But at the same time, sure. So Y 2K gave us the scare that Kurt's describing, you know, in terms of the, you know, we're, this is the burgeoning of the internet era and the information age. We're all kind of transitioning to that, and then we're realizing, holy crap, like what if the computers don't know like that? Like there's gonna be a one after that zero at some point. And so. Then you get terms like doomsday prepper become part of the lexicon Oh yeah. Of modern life. Oh my goodness. And you may or may not have that aunt or uncle who has tons and tons of green beans in a can, and you're wondering, I don't understand. Like what's, it was like a, it's like a big boomer boomer problem, right? They were, they were worried. Were really worried. They were trying, they were trying to prep. They were, that's what they did. You know, didn't stay and, and they had the money to do it. But, you know, but the other thing too is I also think about the ironic nature of the fact that you remember, remember the artist formerly known as Prince, who then became Prince again before, you know, anyhow, he had that song, 1999. Yeah. Which is all about moving into the next millennium, right? Mm-hmm. Do you know when it was released? I actually looked it up specifically because this episode, hoping that we were gonna talk about this sketch.

Kurt Neiswender: 18:07

Well, I, no, was it 2002? No. 1997.

Jamie: 18:17

No. Gonna give you one more guess. Think irony. Irony.

Kurt Neiswender: 18:21

I don't know. So 19 80, 19 88,

Jamie: 18:25

you, you were closer with the first one, and I'm gonna give it to you. 1982, so. Oh, really? Yeah. So Prince, you know, and a lot of people kind of always, well, he was ahead of his time. He was way ahead of his time. Let's just be, apparently, let's just be honest, you know, prince still, you know. Amazing. And in, and a diva in and of himself. And so that's my transition was bringing up Prince. Like I might have set, I might have set that song to this track when I posted on an Insta for multiple reasons in Jamie's brain. But yeah. So Zaha from one

Kurt Neiswender: 19:02

diva to another.

Jamie: 19:03

Yeah. From one Diva to another. Uhhuh. Thank you to Prince.

Kurt Neiswender: 19:06

That's odd. I never actually, the fact that you even asked that I never, I never thought about the year that song was made,

Jamie: 19:16

but we knew all the, we knew all the lyrics. Right. That's a good trick of your

Kurt Neiswender: 19:19

question. You know, we

Jamie: 19:20

knew all the lyrics leading up to 1999 and we didn't know why it's'cause it had been around for 17 years beforehand.

Kurt Neiswender: 19:26

Was was a Defcon It was a Defcon five situation.

Jamie: 19:30

Yeah.

Kurt Neiswender: 19:31

Until 1999. So. Millennium Dome though. So you, I had to ask you and you had to, we had to do a little looking up. So, so it's now been repurposed as the O2 arena, which is a, you know, branded, you know, naming rights and all that stuff. But it's a bit, essentially, I think it's used for concerts, maybe sports of some kind indoor arena. But it was this, this cool dome Who did the dome, do you remember?

Jamie: 20:00

Was it Richard Rogers?

Kurt Neiswender: 20:02

I think so. I think you're right. So was that, was this magazine that's in the, in the frame here all about the the dome? Yeah.

Jamie: 20:10

Richard Rogers. The, the whole, yeah, the whole project. Yeah. So it was a is this like, so the magazine that's in the frame is ta Yeah, it was a special issue of architecture Review the British version. Right? Oh. And I think just in my own. You know, architecture theory and history, fascination with things like occasionally I would, I felt like I had my finger on the pulse of stuff, at least for my own world. And so yeah, I was, I was super excited about it. And it was, you know sort of an interesting way to you know, learn a little bit about something across the pond that I wasn't necessarily going to visit at that time. No money. But yeah,

Kurt Neiswender: 20:50

DEFCON Defcon three situation there. Yeah. Defcon

Jamie: 20:53

three financially.

Kurt Neiswender: 20:55

So yeah, I used, I used to, I remember when all this was being designed and developed and. And, and, and you still, I used to because the folly nature of it was so bizarre. You know, like Za ha's, well, za ha's part was the the human, well, how much of it was her, the human figure that you could occupy? Like it was like a, you could walk into this thing, right?

Jamie: 21:18

Yeah, no. So like, hers was juxtaposed against the human figure. Oh. And so, like, for me, like the human figure was sort of, sort of creepy right? Yeah. The way every, every image of I saw it was sort of creepy, which I think we're gonna talk about some of that oddly, oddly enough in a moment. But I looked at her sort of mind zone pavilion, sort of the way you're describing it as sort of this installation art folly. And it, to me, it was like a reclining figure. So that's why the sketches such as it is for me is it's, it's the, the mind zone sort of profile that's really recognizable and then the figure kind of right up next to it. And, you know, Kurt's pulling up kind of the model of that, of that folly installation. And I, and I think that that's part of also kind of where my head was at as an architect and as a young designer at that point too is sort of interest in architecture that was exploring the nature of, you know, being temporary, being timely you know, exploiting kind of an idea and kind of embracing it, you know, both with space and design. In this particular case, when I see this form, even, even the one that, you know, Kurt has sort of pulled up as the model, I still see, you know, a, a reclining form. Whether or not that had anything to do with Za ha's work at the time, it, that's what resonated with me. And I think that that's okay too from a, from the point of, you know, knowing where those influences are coming from. But, you know, her work as a architect has always inspired me. And, you know, she was a prolific illustrator and, and painter, and I think that that just as a, as a starting point certainly was something of, of, you know, interest all, all the way through, you know, kind of, you know, my fascination at least with her work.

Kurt Neiswender: 23:16

Yeah. I think you know, I, I, I enjoy the fact that the students that I teach these days if they, if they can name one architect, they, it's Zaha. Right. They, they, they, they don't necessarily always associate the names of architects with the designs of the buildings. I think, you know, the Instagram nature and, you know, I don't wanna knock it too hard today. We can, we can save that for another day in a different def con, but they do recognize the work of Zaha, which I appreciate. And, and now that she's passed away, it's, it's like interesting to see the students reference, you know reference her work and, and, and sort of gravitate to it. Now, I'm not really sure where it's coming from, maybe because it is so abstract and, and, and avant-garde in a way. Like there's, there's. It doesn't look like a building, like what they think buildings or the familiarity of what a building is. Right. But it is still architecture, right? It's, it closes space and, you know, works with form. So, so, yeah. You know, it's, it is kind of fun to, to bring, bring this thing back as a, and now I'm gonna go down after this, after this talk, we're gonna, I'm gonna go off in a rabbit hole before I go into zone out on tv, I might probably go back to mind zone and look at some more of the installations and the the dome itself and all that.'cause it, you know, the thing is that it is, it's like a big tent and everything lived under the tent and, and you know, next to each other. So there's very, like, like you said, juxtaposed, like there, there's not a lot of, I. From what I remember, it wasn't very complimentary from one pavilion to another. Right. Like as space or, or design wise. So they were just all coexisting underneath this giant tent. Right. Sort of like a, a, a, what's the word? The circus

Jamie: 25:26

a little bit. I think circus is the right word. And, and even talking about your students kind of in the way that you have, I think is really astute. It's, it's funny because, you know, you and I grew up at least in a situation where as we were becoming familiar with Za ha's work, it was moving from paper architecture into built form, but in a, a pretty slow progression. Right? And, and so when you see something like mind zone, I. At, you know, this sort of cusp of the millennium and all of the work that's kind of, you know, going into showcase. It's under the Tent by Richard Rogers, you know, Richard Rogers, you know, you know, formally, you know, partnering with Renzo Piano. I mean, you know, there's, there's a, a genealogy of sorts, you know, of architecture history or contemporary architecture history that sort of, you know, is kind of imagine that wave as a young professional, right? And so when you sort of see this work by her, you know, in this particular location, it's sort of fascinating. And then as you say, sort of you catapult that forward into kind of their portfolio, her portfolio of work or firm firm's portfolio of work is the commissions start to get larger. The projects get to, you know, get to be more ambitious and, and those early paper architecture ideas, if you're familiar with them. You can start to find that through line.

Kurt Neiswender: 26:55

Mm-hmm.

Jamie: 26:56

You know, even though now, you know, and, and, and as a, as a firm grows, you know, the, the principal designers kind of hands kind of get, you know, further and further away from the work to a certain degree, which we all understand'cause it's collaborative in nature. But I think that as your students are sort of dipping into it, I think they would potentially really appreciate sort of that through line of kind of going backwards as opposed to going forwards. Because when you start to move forwards after Zaha kind of starts to work with Schumacher, you know, now the firm sort of has taken a little bit of a different, you know, tack and, and one that, you know, doesn't, doesn't personally resonate with me as much. A lot of it's because of his political statements. I mean, you know, and, and I'm sorry that matters. But, you know, but her work is, has an indelible mark on that studio. And, and this one is just sort of a, an oddball kind of in that mix of the portfolio, like you described. It's sort of a circus tent. And I think that even critics of the Millennium Dome as a, as a spectacle would, would probably, you know, say that you're pretty accurate,

Kurt Neiswender: 28:12

right? Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I did a little Googling before we got Live Live and saw some article headlines of like, you know, yeah. Very over overpriced, you know, over overbuilt or, you know, very expensive waste of money, da da da. You know, things that happen when you, you know, you go for something that has, it's not been done in, in, you know, in, in that way before. So. You know, there's always gonna be some, some haters in the, in the mix, but your point on through line, I think is something that I, I've tried to I've not used that word, but I'm, I'm gonna try and use it some more, but with, with, with my young students, the second year that I'm teaching right now is this sometimes they, they generate, you know, they're, they're doing really well with iterating. You know, we're, we're kind of pushing them to like, make multiple iterations of things and move quickly, move quickly and just sketch, get sketch and or model, model model. And then they'll generate something that may not necessarily meet all the programmatic requirements, but is interesting from a form and composition. And I say, well, don't delete that. It might come back later in the semester or maybe even in a different year. But something like this is very interesting. May not fit the project that we have right now, but it's, it's, there's something about it, right? That they've, they've stumbled across or, or, or worked through. And and I say, you know, these are all reference, right? Like, anything that you work on can be useful for reference in any project, you know, and, and you know, back, like, I don't know about you, but when we did a lot of stuff on paper and by hand, right? Sketching or modeling you know, we, I couldn't always save every single model. I mean, I would try and photograph what I could and then you, you, you retain that record. But the sketch or the physical, you know, you can't save everything'cause it accumulates in your. Dorm room and you know, your dorm mates get, get grouchy. But now with the digital tools, you know, digital software, stuff like that, you know, it's just, it's a wait list file on the computer. So as long as you have good filing practices,

Jamie: 30:38

well, it's, it's, it's a wait list file file management. But, but, but here's, here's the, that here's the, the emphasis on the phrase through line is at some point, you know, and you and I do this a lot on the, on the podcast even subconsciously, is that we have these touchstone moments of projects and people and things that lead to other things in terms of one influencing the next. And even if we don't have the dates exactly right we generally know which one came before what and what influenced what. And, and I think that that. That level of understanding of how the dominoes start to stack up and how they start to fall is, is really, really important. Because just as you're suggesting to the students to say, that's a really great kernel of an idea, don't lose that. You know, it's not right for this project. That's okay, but you're, you've stumbled onto something really good. You know, that's, that's the encouragement, right? That's the lifting up, you know, that sometimes we have to do in the design process. That's a great idea. Hold onto it, you know, don't lose it, don't use it right now. But, you know, but, but find a way to realize that, you know, at that point the thought process that got you there. And then also the application of it in a future project, because I think that that's sort of a really unique skill that, you know you know, for me when I say mature designer or when I've mature, felt like I've matured as a designer. Not necessarily age wise, but just it's that skill. It's honing that skill to reach back to influences and pieces of projects, either my own or someone else's, to kind of understand them and let them help me as I iterate on whatever I'm working on today.

Kurt Neiswender: 32:30

Yeah, I mean, it's like why we keep our sketchbooks too, right? Sometimes I flip through an old one and I go, oh, wow, I did that like an old sketch. Yeah. Sometimes you, I mean, not to say that I haven't improved design or sketching skills since, you know, from an older sketchbook, but sometimes you look back and go, oh, that actually wasn't half bad, you know, a 10-year-old sketch, you know, so. So, yeah. Yeah. It's, this has been, it's kind of a fun conversation about looking, looking backward to move forward a little bit and and, and sort of reach into those you know, use the, the memory you know, you're, you're either you're, whatever you can store in the brain or if you, you know, pull it up in a, in a, a sketch or something like that. Yeah.

Jamie: 33:20

Well, and before we, we, we speed through the lightning round. That's sort of the next phase of, of moving past this Good discussion. I do want to, let's go back to the, the, the split screen and then you can kind of shift your, your photos on the mirror. cause I have one more prop to share. So I have to say that. So that

Kurt Neiswender: 33:43

Uhhuh,

Jamie: 33:44

that is my Zaha, the little puppy there.

Kurt Neiswender: 33:48

Oh, right. Yeah. Right, right, right, right. So

Jamie: 33:50

MM and I's First Dog. So Zaha in, you know, not necessarily like a 3D printed, you know, but maybe definitely a CNC file. So like, kind of old school D-I-Y-C-N-C. Did you make that thing? Oh hell yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah, so three piece, three pieces of plywood, marine grade, plywood and assembled it. There isn't, there's, it's all dowed together. There's no screws, snails, or anything. Ah, and then stained and so. It is the epitome of architecture taken to a new level architecture.

Kurt Neiswender: 34:28

We, yeah, we haven't really done a lot of we could go, we've talked a little bit about architecture from time to time, but we've not ever dug deep into you know, formal, formal presentation of architecture. Yeah. But dog architecture, I need to get a, a little architecture going on, you know, indoor, outdoor. It was fun.

Jamie: 34:49

It was fun. And you could see by the, by the age of em in that picture how many years ago that was. But but it was a, a super 19,

Kurt Neiswender: 34:56

nine. Just kidding.

Jamie: 34:57

Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah. No, she was not alive. She was not alive then. Yeah. Yeah, so definitely some fun tech iterations. Oh, Zaha. Yeah, Zaha.

Kurt Neiswender: 35:08

So. Thanks. Yeah, thanks for the memory. The okay, so flash. Oh, where's it, where's that go? Yeah, flash. So

Jamie: 35:16

we ready for, ready for the, the so this some,

Kurt Neiswender: 35:19

yeah, sorry, go ahead.

Jamie: 35:21

This is the, this is where we might go from DEFCON three to DEFCON two because this is what technology is doing to us folks. Yeah,

Kurt Neiswender: 35:27

right there. There's the defcon too. So we decided to do a little, little Ai ai enhancements to, to Jamie's sketch. Well, I was dabbling with some other things before we started recording and Jamie pulled up the new sketch. So then we sort of like hybridized our workflow a little bit with sketch and multiple sketches merged together. And then, you know, using AI that this the viscom tool that we've been tinkering with, but. The, the, so the left image I put, I wanted to put two, the two together. I thought it'd be a little less scary, the left, but we could zoom in the left. Image is and interpret. Oh, please. No,

Jamie: 36:10

don't scoot. Don't zoom in. Like it scares me every time. You do. Please, please. It's

Kurt Neiswender: 36:15

enough. It, it reminds me of oh God. What? There's a movie. Of course. It's a movie, but could be like seven deadly sins, you know? I don't know.

Jamie: 36:24

Like you mean the movie? Seven or

Kurt Neiswender: 36:26

seven?

Jamie: 36:26

Seven, yeah. Seven. Yeah. This is, this is like gluttony, like, yeah. I,

Kurt Neiswender: 36:30

I, I, I kind of like the the hairy, the hairy nature, because it's like picking up on your sketchy squiggles, but then turning it into hair.

Jamie: 36:40

But then it's also the body is disemboweled Kurt. It's like,

Kurt Neiswender: 36:43

yeah, like,

Jamie: 36:44

like let's let you're, you're kind of. Leaving out the punchline, right?

Kurt Neiswender: 36:49

Like, well, it's, it's very difficult to describe what, what has happened. Yeah. It's sort sort of like a dismembered, dis, dis involved patient in a hospital. I, you know, with, with hair, Harry, Harry, hairy hair

Jamie: 37:04

and maybe a drawing of a building on the wall, like they've scrawled it with those weird implements that they've left on the magazine.

Kurt Neiswender: 37:11

Yeah. Well, at least it didn't get all zealous with this. The pens,

Jamie: 37:16

there is a peg leg, folks,

Kurt Neiswender: 37:18

so the, yeah, so we're not doing a great, it's very, we will, we'll put these in the show notes somehow. Ooh, boy. My hair. But, so, so the one on the left is holds like, I think 75% influence on your sketch. And the one on the right is like 25%. So it still has this sort of like open sketchbook look, which I kinda like. You like it too, I think. But this is more about buildings. I think we used a different feeder image, but it

Jamie: 37:49

No, you did a double, you did a double image feed and then like a, a short prompt, so

Kurt Neiswender: 37:55

Oh, and then, and then, yeah. Okay. And then but so it's like open sketchbook and then like three dimensional buildings pop up, which could be the feature, right. Like a vr, ar, you know, like I, I sketched something and then I flip it open and then it extrudes buildings and makes three like an old popup book. Yeah. Kind of cool. The coffee cup is. Old popup book

Jamie: 38:21

versus I'm not even sure where to, to start describing the sketch on the left, other than it frightens me a lot. Gosh. Keep zooming up on it. It's just that's,

Kurt Neiswender: 38:33

well, now we have to go back and maybe compare, compare your sketch to the, you know, there's some some honor to the to the composition, I suppose with the pens.

Jamie: 38:45

Like, have you seen like John Hayek's, like sketches that he does with sort of architecture poetry, and then does his follies off of that? Like, yeah, like that to me, like if you just kind of like, if you cover up one eye and you don't look at the dude part of the weird AI sketch. Oh

Kurt Neiswender: 39:05

yeah, I see what you're saying.

Jamie: 39:06

Like, yeah. Yeah. The, the, the folly aspect of the sketch that I'm imagining this disempowered individual has drawn on the wall. I'm sorry to have to say that phrase out loud folks, but like, it, it, it makes me think of Hayek a little bit, sort of in this sort of styling of it, or like an Aldo Rossi, like, you know, crayon sketch or something like that. Mm-hmm. It's got kind of those sort of geometric forms, but my God, like, like the, the form that it's sort, and it's like, like AI is just like dug in on this figure, like, and it, it's like rendered like a whole face that's not even like in the original sketch and given it this crazy hair that looks like something out of Akira. And then like, and then the, I don't know, it's just, I think it's

Kurt Neiswender: 39:56

because it has more facial features than your sketch edge. Yeah. So it looks more human. It's, it was definitely a very surprising result.'cause it's fun, it's fun prompting the ai and then it spins a little bit and it's like pulling the, the roulette or the pulling the, the lever on the, on the, the price is right. The slot machine. The slot machine.

Jamie: 40:20

Like the, the, the wheel are you talking about the wheel on the price is right. Not

Kurt Neiswender: 40:24

the wheel, the lever. Like, you try and get a dollar, like a slot machine, you know? Oh. cause it spins and then you don't know what it's gonna produce. So there's way too

Jamie: 40:34

many pop culture references in this like episode. We're,

Kurt Neiswender: 40:37

we're cram, we're just cramming'em all in there now. Yeah. So anyway. Well, well, I think the, the, the, the outcome of this though, my summary for, for the day is, is, is perhaps I, I need to figure out how to predict. Be a little more predictive of what the AI could is gonna generate based on what we're feeding it, you know? cause that was a bit of a surprise outcome. I was not

Jamie: 41:04

expecting, well, admittedly, we did give it two images to play off of that. Were two, they were two images of the same subject, but rendered wholly different. And then we did not give it a lot to go on in terms of an explanation. So I think part of it was like, what do you think? And what we got was like a dumpster fire, but that's okay.

Kurt Neiswender: 41:29

A nightmare. It's, it's just nightmares. Jamie's nightmares.

Jamie: 41:33

Yep. I'm gonna sleep well tonight folks. Thanks.

Kurt Neiswender: 41:35

Yeah. Well, you know, go watch some some, what was it? Prime target.

Jamie: 41:40

Well, I, I mean, I watched Firewalk with me last night, so, you know, you know, what am I doing to myself?

Kurt Neiswender: 41:45

A lot of Dre Yeah. You're gonna have a lot of, a lot of nightmares.

Jamie: 41:49

Yeah.

Kurt Neiswender: 41:50

So, all right, all friend.

Jamie: 41:53

Thanks

Kurt Neiswender: 41:53

buddy. Thanks. Well see you next week.