Blair Subbaraman
University of Washington
May 24, 2023
Concentration
Agency and Expertise in Digital Fabrication Systems
Understanding Agency
Practitioners have agency
Computational compensation increases agency
Agency can be evaluated a priori
Understanding Agency
Practitioners have agency
Computational compensation increases agency
Agency can be evaluated a priori
Practitioners + systems together produce different capacities for action
Agency emerges in practice
Agency changes over time
The Elasticity of 'Control'
"The term planning, in other words, exhibits an elastic quality: as a technical proposition it refers to a quite specific and circumscribed set of functionalities and algorithms, but as an empirical proposition it refers to anything at all that can plausibly be glossed with the term."
- Agre, Towards a Critical Technical Practice
"To Create is to be Creative"
End-to-End Systems Occlude Practitioner Agency
Personal Fabrication, Baudisch & MuellerRevomaker, Gao et al.
Seizing Control
Prioritizing Practitioner Engagement
FreeD, Zoran et al.Interactive Fabrication, Willis et al.
Ceding Control
Prioritizing Material Agency
"As practitioners, the builder, the gardener, the cook, the alchemist and the painter are not so much imposing form on matter as bringing together diverse materials and combining or redirecting their flow in the anticipation of what might emerge."
- Ingold, The Textility of MakingPost-Anthropocentric 3D Printing, Devendorf et al.
Editable Agencies
Accounting for System Changes
Cardboard Machine Kit, Peek et al.Dynamic Brushes, Jacobs et al.
From Expert Users to Users with Expertise
LINC, Li et al.Fabrication from a CAD Enviroment, Fossdal et al.
Further Provocations
Machine Precision for Material ExplorationAbstract Correspondences (Source: Making, Ingold)
“Design success rests on the extent and efficacy of one’s analysis of specific environments of devices and working practices, finding a place for one’s own technology within them.”
- Suchman, Located Accountabilities in Technology Production Evaluation TimescalesExpanding the Bounds of the System
Craft as Making's Foil
Craft
Low Tech
Embodied Skill
Autographic
Making
High Tech
Computational Skill
Allographic
The Technical Nature of Craft & Craft Sensibilities of Making
Craftspeople as Technical Collaborators, Devendorf et al.p5.fab, Subbaraman & Peek
A Rubric for Describing Expertise
Modalities of Interaction
How do practitioners engage the system?
Material Engagement
What materials can be used with the system?
System-Material Interdependencies
What is foregrounded, interactions with the system or with the materials?
Contextualization in a Workflow
Where are we in a broader workflow?
Visual Mappings
What is the mapping between software variables and machine parameters– if any?
Evaluation
Can we make artifacts that we like more or less?
Audience
Who is intended to use the system? Who actually is? Who is excluded?
Methods
Systems Design and Empirical Methods in Digital Fabrication Research
Systems Design & Empirical Research
Individual Practice
Evaluation methods
Interpretive Flexibility: Technology can be continuously reinterpreted, used in new ways