Summer of 2006, I worked in the Robotics, Vision, and Sensor Networks (RVSN) group at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) creating an as-built model of Frank Gehry's Stata Center. For my work on this project, I was nominated for and won the first annual Ray Stata Student Innovation Award.

Home to CSAIL and a couple of other MIT labs, the Stata center is a highly irregular building with many curved and slanted walls, which presented a challenge for robotic navigation. An accurate model is needed for robotics location and navigations research as well as a basis for comparision for computer generated models of the building. In addition, because the Stata is so irregular, the original plans and CAD models from Frank Gehry differ quite a bit from the actual building, so a model true to the as-built structure is needed.

The model was constructed in AutoCAD and eventually exported and converted into vertices, edges, and faces. I started with 2D floorplans provided by MIT's facilities department and made many measurements around the building to get the actual dimensions. In order to expedite the process, I wrote several scripts using AutoCAD's coding language, AutoLisp to automate repetitive actions such as creating a long wall, creating large patches of floor and ceiling, and calculating slants of walls based on given points.

By then end of the summer, we complete modeling about 70% of the Stata center. Here is a documentation of my work.

A model of the 4th floor of Stata, end of summer 2006