Digital fabrication is a process that merges design and manufacture through the use of digital tools (software) and computer-controlled manufacturing processes. Such processes position "digital natives" in the forefront of craft and form generation. Today, engineers, designers and artists are leading the development of new sculpting, construction and manufacturing strategies. Methods such as CNC milling, laser cutting, robotic fabrication among others, allow us to materialise radical new forms inspired by biological processes, mathematics and computational geometry.

Lecturers: Clemens Winkler, Luke Franzke

Contents 

• Project Briefs
• Software
• Tools
• Readings
• Documentation Template

Topic: Future Food

This years topic is Future Food. How does the digital fit with a supremely analogue experience of experiencing flavours and aromas? Emerging technologies will change how we work in the kitchen, how we experience eating, how we gain nutrients and how our food consumption impacts the environment. Current food production methods are polarised with highly mechanised industrial fabrication on one side and intimate, small scale artisanal practices on the other. Digital Fabrication has allowed industrial processes to become bespoke and more accessible, could this also be the case for food? Will we be working together with robots in the kitchen, will we design our own food on the genetic level. How might digital fabricated food give us new sensory experiences, or play with or perceptions to give us fulfilling experiences while making us healthier or less consuming of natural resources? 

Possible subtopics:

• Digital fabricated food
• Lab-Grown Meat 
• Hybrid Fabrication in food production (new paradigms for food production between artisan and mass production) 
• Automation 
• New mechanism of nutrition (Intravenous? Aerosols ? Soylentgreen?) 
• Generative design of aromas, textures, flavours and forms. 

Deliverables:

• Individual Mini Project  
• Final Group Project and Presentation -  (At the end of week 2)
• Documentation - Documentation of your work in the template provided (Per Group). 
• Attendance during lessons

Topic Links and References :

• Astronaut food: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vVle67Tfjc
• https://space10.io/project/future-food-today-a-space10-cookbook/
• http://www.fluxmagazine.com/molecular-gastronomy/
• https://www.asme.org/engineering-topics/articles/robotics/robots-kitchen-at-the-table
• https://the-dots.com/projects/dinnerdata-future-food-speculative-design-242917
• The Futurist cookbook: http://www.sternberg-press.com/index.php?pageId=1545&l=en&bookId=439&sort=year
• Synesthetic Design: Handbook for a Multi-Sensory Approach 
• Multisensuelles Design. Eine Anthologie Herausgegeben von Peter Luckner

EXCURSION:

https://designerstable.ch/¨

Other ideas: 

• https://www.alimentarium.org
• Renoult EIT Food Research 
• EPFL food laboratory 
• Nestle 
• Mushroom robotic Harvesting : https://www.venturekick.ch/Agrinium
• DNA nutrition startup in Lausanne   

ToDos for Luke and Clemens: 

Prepare Raw Material:  

• Chocolate for melting
• Silicone 
• Molecular Gastronomy Materials 

Prepare Methods for digital fabricating foods:

• Silicone casting process
• 3D print Cholocate 
• Laser-cut food
• ?? 

Logistics  

• Find room from the final presentation 
• Find a space for a more permanent exhibit (stammtisch?) 
• Find room for software inputs 
• Get a screen for inputs (or beamer)

Time Plan 

Room for all days: 3.E07-A