Justin Engbrecht

16 posts

Summing Up 2020

May 2, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Student Work, Summing Up 2020, zw 2020

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It certainly was an eventful semester. I learned a ton about how aesthetics influences our everyday lives. Additionally, this course showed me the societal divide between the arts and engineering, and I made my best effort over the semester to bridge the gap and incorporate both artistry and engineering within my projects. In future personal…

Final Report Part 2 2020: Desk Lamp

April 27, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Final Project Part 2 2020, Student Work, zw 2020

Why and What Next My laser cut enclosure panels finally arrived, so I was able to construct my desk lamp! Functional Motivation My main functional goal for this project was to alleviate the poor lighting in my room in graduate housing. I only have a single overhead light, that is far from centrally positioned. Accordingly,…

Final Report Part 1 2020: Desk Lamp

April 18, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Final Project Part 1 2020, Student Work, zw 2020

Desk Lamp Enclosure Currently, the completion of my project has been delayed by factors outside of my control. While I was relieved to hear that as of Wednesday (4/15) evening, my enclosure panels had arrived in Commerce City, CO, according to the UPS tracking number, no transit progress was made for multiple days. The scheduled…

Main Project Construction Update 2020: Desk Lamp

April 14, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Main Project Construction Update 2020, Student Work, zw 2020

Ordered Component Progress The major progress so far has been the arrival of the light socket and plug that I ordered [1]. In order to expedite the placement of my decorative panel laser cutting order from Ponoko, a side view of the light base was used with a pixel analyzer. Figure 1. Brighttia website [1]…

Aesthetic Roots 2020: Modern/Futuristic Geometric Desk Lamp

April 7, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Student Work, Your Aesthetic Roots 2020, zw 2020

Main Project Aesthetic Inspiration Prior to the pandemic, I had just finished re-watching the first season of Westworld with some future housemates in preparation for the season 3 premiere. In the teaser trailers leading up to the newest season, we were able see some of the first glimpses of the world outside of the wild…

Favorite Youtube Design/Build Videos: Mark Rober

March 30, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Favorite Youtube design/build videos 2020, Student Work, zw 2020

Mark Rober’s “Package Thief vs. Glitter Bomb Trap” While I would have loved to find a lesser known creator, I feel that Mark Rober’s package thief bait videos match the spirit of the fast approaching April 1st quite well. Achieving certifiably viral status, his prank on those with nefarious intentions is quite the display of…

Design Review 2020 Part 2: Desk Lamp

March 16, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Design Review 2020 Part 2: Timeline and Logistics, Student Work, zw 2020

Timeline My project has been complicated by the closing of the ITLL due to the COVID-19 pandemic. My only option for fabricating my laser cut desk lamp on campus is now the Rapid Prototyping Lab’s laser cutter within the Idea Forge. The Idea Forge now has reduced hours (open 9 AM – 5 PM) for…

Design Review 2020 Part 1: Desk Lamp

March 8, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Design Review 2020 Part 1: Detailed Plans, Student Work, zw 2020

Aesthetic Inspiration As explained in my previous posts, I decided to create something similar to the laser cut wooden desk lamp shown below as Figure 1. Figure 1. Futuristic desk lamp [1] creating a cascade design from laser cut wood I would also like to add a metallic silver paint to the wooden panels that…

Top 5 Constraints 2020: Desk Lamp

February 28, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Student Work, Top 5 Constraints 2020, zw 2020

After deliberating a bit, I have chosen to follow Option 3: Futuristic Laser Cut Sections of my last “Main Project Aesthetics” post when creating my desk lamp. I hope to create something similar to the featured image design [1] by laser cutting wood into a sleek, decorative arrangement of geometric shapes. Again, I hope to…

Main Project Aesthetics 2020: Desk Lamp

February 24, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Main Project Aesthetic 2020: plans and alternatives, Student Work, zw 2020

Option 1: Medieval Fantasy Hightower Spire Following my inspiration post, the first option of aesthetic to apply to my desk lamp would be to create a replica of the Song of Ice and Fire universe’s Hightower in Oldtown. If I choose this option, I will make my desk lamp sufficiently tall (~1m height) and add…

Main Project Inspiration 2020: Desk/Table Lamp

February 18, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Main Project Inspirations 2020, Student Work, zw 2020

Introduction For this course’s Main Project, I would like to create something with regular functional use. My current room in graduate housing only has one oddly-positioned overhead light, so even with an additional off-the-shelf lamp, in the evenings I’ve been finding that it’s functionally impossible to get any non-computer work (paperwork, reading. etc.) done within…

Upcycle Final Report 2020: Pocket-Sized Sketchpad

February 10, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Student Work, Upcycle Final Report 2020, zw 2020

Upcycle Inspiration While we were discussing the importance of doodling within lecture, I realized that while I have a full-size notebook in my backpack dedicated to this course, I wanted another smaller sketchpad that I can carry in my pocket for whenever inspiration strikes me. In the context of upcycling, creating pages for this notebook…

Upcycle Progress 2020: Pocket-Sized Sketchpad

February 5, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Student Work, Upcycle Progress 2020, zw 2020

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Shortly after making my inspiration post, I found an extremely similar process conducted by a craft-cycle.com user “McKenzie” posted to the site – https://www.craft-cycle.com/upcycled-receipt-notebook-2/ – on August 3rd of last year, with pretty promising results regarding notebook/sketchpad functionality. Reading through this post addressed a lot of my own concerns regarding how I would proceed with…

Aesthetics Game 2020: Novelty Roadside Architecture and Coat Hangers

February 3, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Aesthetics Game 2020, Student Work, zw 2020

Group members: Justin Engbrecht (myself), Patrick Bodine-Ellison, and Benjamin Robles For the Aesthetics Game this semester conducted by guest lecturer Dr. Greg Whiting, our table received the object “Coat hanger” and the aesthetic “Novelty Architecture / Roadside Vernacular Architecture”. We initially had no idea what this aesthetic was, and had to google it to find…

Upcycle Inspiration 2020: Pocket-Sized Sketchpad

January 27, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Student Work, Upcycle Inspiration 2020, zw 2020

While we were discussing the importance of doodling within lecture the past week, I realized that while I have a full-size notebook in my backpack dedicated to this course, I may want another smaller sketchpad that I can carry in my pocket for whenever inspiration strikes me. In the context of upcycling, creating pages for…

Aesthetic Exploration 2020: Retrofuturism

January 18, 2020

Justin Engbrecht

Aesthetic Explorations 2020, Student Work, zw 2020

For my first aesthetic exploration, I have chosen to explore the Retrofuturism aesthetic. Building upon the concept of futurism, retrofuturism has the distinction of showing retro styling and perspective at odds with a futuristic depiction, especially regarding technology and machinery. Visually, retrofuturism eschews the blocky form in favor of curves and contours, often featuring vibrant…