Upon earlier research I read a little about the history of the New Palace Theatre, and realised it’s always been pivotal in the surrounding area and attracted a lot of people to its more successful shows. I’m wondering if a successful businessman was to take on this building again, it may start a regeneration of the area. It would instantly attract a different sort of people and with that other types of businesses would follow instead of pubs and clubs. It’s all very interesting when it’s thought about in detail. I think this one building could be a pivotal point to transforming Stonehouse…

Anyway enough of the text, see for yourself. As the saying goes, a picture speaks a thousand words so let’s save us all some time!

Pics swf walk2…

See what I mean? Thought so.

Unfortunately my battery died before we finished our walk so there was more work done but not as well recorded. You can see our route as I recorded it using my iPhone and its very handy app; GPS Tracking.

Pic of instamapper route…

Other things I noticed along this point was things in general just needed replacement or more frequent maintenance, everything that was made of metal had rust on it, benches, bins, fences etc. And anything made of wood was rotten such as little shelters with benches full of cobwebs. What I found quite frustrating was the fact that you could see beyond the mess was some really stunning views, the sort of views you’d expect at Newquay for example. The annoying thing was that in front of every nice view was a fence with sharp rusty edges, it was like everything within that containment was old and ugly and everything outside was natural, bright and pleasant.

So after realising all this I decided that when I walk around other parts of Stonehouse with my group, to continue this old and ugly with clean and new theme and see what I come up with.

Pics swf walk1…

For this I did the map drawings after taking the pictures.

Pics of map drawings…

So I started drawing on top of the map and notated the following to where I believed they were;

• Residential areas
• Commercial areas (I only knew of shops on Union street)
• MOD. I kind of cheated here as I remembered what I saw on the earlier map which Shaun showed us
• Dock areas
• Open spaces, such as parks and gaps between residential areas for example

I’ve never been great at drawing by hand but I’m still happy with the result. I feel you can see what I’m trying to achieve. Also because of this I scanned the image and recreated it digitally using Photoshop. This makes everything look much cleaner and more vibrant, and adds scope for development. Now I’ve done this I think that when I walk around Stonehouse with my group I can then put my results on top of this as a comparison. I’ll also export the images as separate layers as well of course!

Pics of Stonehouse before the walk…

This is one of the oldest examples I could find which notates small pictures on a map to dictate what is where. Although it is said that this obviously isn’t to scale, at the time it must have been a real breakthrough for anyone who used it first.

Mappa mundi pics…

Raoul Bunschote

The two examples below are very interesting and very relevant to this whole project. They are very inspirational to me as they look quite nice, and obviously took some time to get the end product. What’s also interesting is that at first glance it’s just a piece of art as you can’t really understand what’s going on. But upon closer inspection and some thought you can see the amount of detail that is in these pieces. There’s a key which tries to explain what is what. Or at least there are some lines which connect the key to the actual map. The black and white image with red objects looks as though it was created as part of some sort of poster design for some architectural interest. Like when a new area has a plan they always post posters up around that area to show people what the newly developed area will look like. 

Raoul pics…

Geographical Information Networks

After an earlier lecture by Shaun Murray he gave us some ideas to Google and get some ideas/inspiration from. As well as Raoul Bunschote, we were recommended we check out Geographical Information Networks. And below are some examples of what I found:

Pics of geo info…

All these examples are maps which use colours and simple graphics to notate and teach the user what it’s all about. This is what I intend to do at some point after I’ve walked around Stonehouse. I intend to use a map, draw on it and scan it in and play with it in Photoshop and see what I can do with it.

Use of maps in modern technologies

Satellite Navigational Systems

For the last 5-10 years Satellite Navigational systems have used digital maps to help people find their way around the world or to help them get lost. Either way they are now vastly used in motor vehicles and other forms of transport such as cycling and even walking.

Although I’m only planning on creating a 2D map of Stonehouse, the modern sat navs are a useful source of information for me, and things I can look at are; 

• Colours used
• How they’re graphically produced – They don’t normally use Google maps for example
• And the way things are displayed in the maps

Sat nav pics…

iPhone

One of the big features on the iPhone is the integration of Google maps with a compass, this makes it extremely easy to get around anywhere you can pick up a signal. But there’s a few apps that have gone one step further;

• Cyclopedia
• Layar
• GPS Tracker

I recently downloaded these apps after a recommendation from Mike Philips. They’re really cool, with Cyclopedia you can see what’s around you and near you depending on your distance settings and direction you’re facing. When you see somewhere of interest you touch the icon and view some basic info about it. It’s very clever and the way it displays the map in real time depending on your position and direction is very cool!

Layar is similar but a bit textier. You start by searching what it is you’re looking for then when you click on it, it displays where it is either on a map or shows you the distance real time whilst you’re viewing your surroundings through your camera lense.

GPS Tracker is an app which turns the iPhone into (You guessed it!) a GPS tracker. You set up your account and start up the app and go. Works best whilst walking, I intend on using this app whilst walking around Stonehouse so I can look back and see where I went. This saves some hassle for me to write down every street I went down. I think I may also use this as part of my final piece which will show my journey and then all the data I take form my route will appear around it. Could look cool!

iPhone pics…

More traditional mapping

Whilst looking through and writing about all these cool technologies and various ways of modern mapping techniques I didn’t want to miss out the traditional road signs which dictate routes and directions. These are obviously useful when going somewhere for the first time. I take this into my ideas for mapping Stonehouse. The images I create need a key and these key’s need to be obvious on the map, and dictate instantly what is happening and where everything is around it. In my opinion if someone doesn’t understand what they’re looking at then many won’t like it! This is my main criticism of some people’s work I saw on the internet when searching for examples.

Pics of street signs…

Below are some examples which have inspired me most.

Comparing old with new

One of my main ideas at the moment is to compare the old with the new, the differences in buildings and materials their strengths and weakness’. I may research some old material from World War 1 and 2 as I know Plymouth in general was heavily hit and I’m sure Stonehouse hosting military docks will bound to have something interesting to look at. I’m particularly interested in seeing the buildings amongst other things that are still unchanged now from that period.

I’ll also look into open spaces. Reason being because as Stonehouse is constantly in development, it may be interesting to see how they keep certain areas free of architecture to let everything breath so to speak. This must be a challenge for developers for the area as you don’t want a cramped town full of square buildings. How is this avoided? The uses of roads create borders and boundaries between certain spaces. How much grassland is there around these newly developed areas compared to the old?

I aim to take some photos during my walk of Stonehouse in the hope I can then get some old pictures to compare them with. This may well help with my final project. Time will surely tell!

As you can see there’s quite a difference architecturally. I seem to notice that buildings built before the war were all very grand such as the Palace Theatre. But since the World War the houses look quite grotesque, simple shapes and colours. Almost as if at the time of building things were rushed? Compare to now, buildings are starting to get that clean fresh look. Lighter colours and materials are used, this gives an impact on the surrounding areas of the buildings.

• Taking height measurements and sketch out the differences between certain areas such as the docks and a residential area for example.
• Draw how the wind is directed through the streets, particularly around tall buildings were the wind should be tunnelled in one direction.
• Look at the details of the buildings; old and new and map out how the area has been developed and maybe try and compare this data to reality.

At the moment I’d like to take data of all the above, but I’m particularly interested in the wind direction as I’d like to have a go at recreating this data by building a small scale of a few linking streets. Then add some smoke with the help of a fan through one street and film/take photos of the direction the smoke takes through the surrounding streets.

I’d then like to compare this and see how it responds to my original “drawn” data.

After a chat with Shaun our group went about planning how we’re going to go about this project. We’re going to print off a map of Stonehouse and take some paper and make our sketches on this blank paper over the map. By doing it this way we can then scan the images and add them together without the map behind it.

We’ve been told to do a few sketches before we go to Stonehouse so we can compare with the reality when we actually go there. Below is a map of Stonehouse:

The picture on the right came about when I was playing about with the Hue and Saturation and I got this effect and it gave me another idea; I wonder how accurate this colouration could be in relation to real temperature changes around that area? Something to like into me thinks…