BSLA
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towards the screen and away from the
surface. This industry trend for creating
visual material on a screen has practically
eradicated traditional drawing methods
that had been practiced and perfected for
centuries. In 1995, many architectural
schools replaced their traditional hand
drawing courses with AutoCAD and Form
Z computer classes, graduating young
architects with computer experience, but
practically no hand visualization skills! It
is understandable that young architects
today embrace highly photorealistic
rendering styles and computer visualization
techniques—simply because they NEVER
LEARNED to draw or they’ve FORGOTTEN
their ability to communicate by hand! This
is what one could consider as an industrywide challenge to designers— “What can
we do to reintroduce some basic traditional
drawing techniques without backing away
from powerful digital tools and rapidly
evolving software?”
The End of Hand Drawing?
Many in the design industry worry that
hand drawing has already become a thing of
the past: a dinosaur. In fact, in the landscape
architecture profession hand drawing is still
alive and well. In a soon-to-be-published
survey conducted by Daniel Tal and
20
BSLA
graduate student Frank Benton, and
in collaboration with ASLA, one of the
questions asked was the frequency in
which hand drawing was being used on
projects and in offices. Ove r 80% of the
respondents still used hand drawing for
illustration, presentation and design. In
short, for the landscape architectural
profession, hand drawing skills and use
is still of paramount importance.
Similarly, the survey showed that
the use of SketchUp® and other 3D
modeling applications has an greater
than 80% adoption in the industry.
The result is clear: firms see the need
for both hand drawn skills and 3D
programs to best present designs.
This strengthens the notion that
hand drawing, 3D digital modeling
and hybrid methods can co-exist and
be embraced. If anything, combining
hand medium with digital 3D provides
a third solution to many practitioners
wishing to explore different forms of
presentation graphics.
Hand Drawing vs. PhotoRealistic
What is the better medium? Hand
drawn illustrations, photorealism or