DIGITAL CLAY

Sara Codarin

Digital Clay creates a seamless design-to-fabrication workflow using a robotic clay extruder. This tool is instrumental for studying and understanding toolpath strategies for constructing components at various scales, from small objects to large architectural structures. The workflow includes a custom Grasshopper script with an embedded Python component. The workspace combines robotic programming with an Arduino-controlled extruder, ensuring a continuous flow of clay. In this setup, the robot moves through the six-axis enabled three-dimensional space while the extrusion point remains fixed, simplifying hardware troubleshooting. Envisioning a research trajectory that involves additive manufacturing at the architectural scale, the robotic clay extrusion tool allows for testing design possibilities before addressing the complexities and constraints of larger projects.