About the author

Dear readers, today is a glorious day. A good day. My blog has reached its target. It has reached  1020 page views and it has gone beyond my expectation. I did not think that people from other countries would be interested in my blog. It was surprising that people from USA, GB, OZ, NZ, RUS, Sri Lanka, India, Brazil and many more would be interested with a blog from The United Nation Of Malaysia.

As promised I would dedicate one page from this blog towards my life as the author of this blog.I hope that this lil’ blog would continue to help and inspire people to discover and achieve their goals in experimenting with construction. I do promise that whenever i have a new project with the students this would be the 1^st place I would update. Peace , and God Bless.

ABOUT ME....

Dear readers, where should I start? Let’s talk about my educational background, primary school was in Penang. Secondary school was in a boarding school in Jitra Kedah. Tertiary education, USM Penang.

My boarding school experience was fun, made me into the diehard person I am today.USM lecturers did good gave me a solid background regarding building tech. My first 2 years working experience was with a QS consultant company, again had a great experience, my boss was a kind soul, respect Mr.Chiok. I then had a brief work experience with an environmental consultant company, not long after   that entered TARC.

First day in TARC had a bad time with some of the students, it was my 1^st time. Nobody listen to my lecture, my heart nearly stop ticking. Maybe I did wrong, maybe I was not meant to be a lecturer. After   7 years, guess what Im still here, I now know that in order to be a good lecturer you have to be yourself. Teach from your heart.

I got married to Ain not long after, had a baby boy. My first born was a son! Akmal (my son) made me a dad. I swear the first word that came out from his mouth was BUS. He saw a bus and that was what he said. He’s a mini me. He imitates me to the T.

My son on his 5th b'day

At the tender age of 3 my kid and wife had to go to Perth to further her studies. The day they went there was the saddest day in my life. There was no sunshine, rainbows or unicorns. I felt miserable.  

Every end of the semester I had to go there. After a while I got accustomed with the situation. Had an awesome time in Perth, visited lots of places. My favorite spot was Bunnings its a place where DIY guys could hang out for hours.

Albany was gorgeous. Loved the natural environment there. The giant red trees captivated me. And then there was the food. The kebab house keeps me fluffy! All and all it was great fun but it burned a super massive black hole out of my pocket.

natural gap near the Indian ocean

The sign board

Kebabs!

23. DEAR VIEWERS....

Dear all readers, I was sitting alone yesterday reminiscing what I have done for the last 5 years of my life.....well let me tell you it wasn’t much. All I do is dedicated my life to teaching students and i do hope that I managed to help the students to be smart and better stewards for the planet. I know that life is short and its a darn gamble. 2 of my buddies died last year, one on his way to Jakarta on a flight and the other was from OD. This year one of my friends was diagnose with terminal illness and his a healthy living kind of a fella. Again i am dumb struck with the things happening around me. What if this where to happen to me?

Here is a funny sign now laugh!

So i made up my mind that if this blog where to hit 1000 page views before the end of this year 2011 i will dedicate 1 post to my life and all about me as the author of this blog. I was quite surprise with the number of hits (917 ppl) I didn’t expect it to reach that number. Again i would like to thank the viewers because without your comments and page views i would not have the motivation to continue this blog. I would like to end this post with a useful quote that i hold dear to my heart.... “Work like u r going to live for 1000 years and pray like u r going to die tomorrow.”

(it is now 976 ppl )

22. The completed model and presentation

After 7 weeks of hard work the architectural students will now have their chance to convince a group of clients (Qs students) to judge their model. The Qs students will listen to a brief talk by the student architects then observe the presentation of their model through sketch up, manual drawings, mock models and finally the completed model. Qs Students will then put in their grades into a cup and finally the grades will be tally. The final say will still come from me based on the 7 weeks effort done by the architectural students. Overall I would say the process was a joyous occasion and the judge did enjoy their peppermint tea and potato buns.  

 

21. Making the water effects

There were several methods tried and tested to create the water effects. At first we tried using some plastic and crumpling them up to create the rippling effects of the waves but, it wasn’t good enough, not so realistic, it lacked character.

We then tried using a bottle of clear glue and mixing it up with some ink, then with some water colour, again to our aghast it too failed to create the desired finish.

Finally I was blessed by a moment of brilliance, silicone calking, it dries clear and holds its shape as soon as it is applied. Plus.... it’s mouldable. We placed the silicone on a blue plastic and then used some tooth picks and some creativity to create the desired ripples.

 

Silence is golden. Duct tape is silver. ;p

20. Making tree models

After some research we decided that the tree leaf would be more realistic using dish scrubber and combining it with a little bit of moss. For the trunk, we used some old wires twisted them together to get the desired girth. The wires were then covered with some flowering tape (brown) that could be bought at any florist shop. 

 

 

 

19. The real contour

Using the previous contour from Goggle Earth the students measured the distance of the contour line and convert it using their scaled ruler to a ratio of either 1:100 or 1:200.The height intervals of the contour is already fixed to 5m each and that thickens  is also converted to their desired scale.

Students then used Styrofoam boards stacking them on top of each other and shaping them to mimic the original silhouette of the island. After achieving the desired contour, the paper mache technique was applied to make to contour look smooth and as real as possible.

For the grass and soil landscape, we used flower pot oasis and dried moss as grass, real fine beach soil as sand to create the diorama.

                                              

                                           


                            

18.Mock models

As mentioned before, the students made mock models to help them visualize the final product better.In order to save cost, our models contour was made from recycled cardboard box, the building itself was made from mounting boards that was paste with a scaled drawing by the students.The tree leafs was made by tissue paper and twisted wires was used as the trunk of the trees.

17.Model making

The following semester I had to teach a bunch of architectural students on model making techniques. Again, please understand that the students are in a semi public college so our models are low in budget but again we strive with what is available to our disposal. I gave the students 7 weeks to complete a building model to accommodate 300 lecturers and they have the freedom to express their creativity.

The first thing that they have to do is to create a mock model out of cheap materials such as cardboard (for gradients and buildings). Tissue paper and wires was also use to make trees as part of the landscape.

For the gradient, I gave them a spot that is in Teluk Bahang (Penang) and ask them to make use of the Google earth to get the rough contour of the area. 

The steps needed to get the contour:

1.       Google earth , zoom location

2.       Toggle terrain(Sketch up 8 get geolocation)

3.       On hidden geometry

4.       Draw a square below the terrain

5.       Press control and click the square base

6.       Enter intervals of height eg: 5m

7.       Make copies eg: 50x

8.       Highlight box make group

9.       Intersect with model