RUBI LAB

Timber De-Standardized 2.0 is a mixed reality (MR) user interface (UI) that utilizes timber waste produced by manufacturing dimensional lumber, suggesting an expanded notion for “material usability” in timber construction. The expanded notion of designing with discarded logs not only requires new tools and technologies for cataloguing, structuring, and fabricating. It also relies on new methods and platforms for the visualization and design of these structures. As a MR UI, Timber De-Standardized enables professionals and non-professionals alike to seamlessly design with irregular logs and to create viable structural systems using an intuitive MR environment. In order to develop a MR environment with this level of competency, the research aims to finesse the visualization techniques in the immersive full-scale 3D environment and to minimize the use of alternative 2D UI(s). The research methodology focuses on (1) cataloguing and extracting basic properties of various tree logs, (2) refining mesh visualization for better user interaction, and (3) developing the MR UI to increase user design agency with custom menu lists and operations. This methodology will extend the usability of MR UI protocols to a broader audience while democratizing design and enabling the user as co-creator.