#AutodeskGallery: Where's there's smoke... Exhibit

"Life was cherries flambé
 But that was so yesterday
 Then it all went up in smoke
 Now I've been burned
 I'm a bit wiser
 A place in the shade
 Is all I require
 Yet I'm still hypnotized
 When I see fire"
—"Smoke," Todd Rundgren, State, 2013.

Here's the scoop on one our newest exhibits in the lobby that leads into the Autodesk Gallery.

People

• Anouk Wipprecht // more
• Niccoló Casas // more
• Volkswagen // more

Software

• Autodesk Maya // more
• Materialise Magics // more

When people get dressed, they normally ask themselves two things:

• What do I have to do today?
• What do I want people to think when they see me?

I have a system for getting dressed. Each morning I simply grab the shirt in my closet on the end. I then pick pants to go with the shirt. Done. I place clean shirts at one end of the closet and pull shirts to wear from the other end — that way my apparel rotates. I got the idea years ago from the movie, The Fly, where Albert Einstein was quoted as believing that man had a finite amount of thought, so he wore an identical outfit each day to avoid wasting thought on what to wear. I figured that I didn't have to wear the same thing each day, but I could avoid deciding what to wear. My process provides variety as well as lack of thought.

Now imagine if our clothes adapted to our environment? We wouldn't have to pick what to wear. Instead, we'd don one outfit that changed in response to our needs. Dutch fashion-tech designer, Anouk Wipprecht, is blazing a trail in responsive clothing. For example, her intimacy collection uses a material that becomes opaque or transparent, revealing more or less based on interaction.

Commissioned by Volkswagen as a means to challenge conventional thinking about the meaning of clothing and the merger of fashion and technology, the curvaceous, ultra futuristic Smoke Dress combines sensuous lines with sleek interactive technology that interfaces not just with the person wearing it but also the space around the body.

• If another person moves in close, the dress emits a steamy veil of smoke.
• The control unit and sensor technology that make this possible are embedded in the 3D-printed fabric that is made from a durable, advanced synthetic material that emulates the properties of rubber.

To ensure that the dress fit perfectly, a live model was scanned and the 3D data was imported into Maya. Wipprecht worked with architect and 3D geometry expert, Casas, to sculpt around the body, mimicking a traditional fashion designer's craft. This dress reveals how sexy both fashion and technology can be — and proves that when they are fused together, they can generate glamorous heat.

Thanks to the Autodesk Gallery team for the exhibit write-up text for this blog posting (especially that very cool last sentence).

Regardless of what you are wearing, come check out exhibits at the Autodesk Gallery at One Market in San Francisco. The gallery is open to the public on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. There is a guided tour on Wednesdays at 12:30 pm. Visit us.

Clothing is alive in the lab.