People
Alasdair Turner
Lecturer in Urban and Architectural Computing
Course Director MSc Adaptive Architecture & Computation
Academic Director EngD Virtual Environments, Imaging and Visualisation
Research
Alasdair researches models of people movement and social interaction, spatial analysis, generative design, and neural network models of human behaviour. His work on spatial analysis has included the introduction of Visibility Graph Analysis (with Prof Alan Penn, David O'Sullivan and Maria Doxa) and an algorithm to generate axial maps automatically (with Alan Penn and Bill Hillier). His models on people movement, developed with Alan Penn, use agents that are visually coupled to the environment, with an underlying exosomatic visual architecture (that is, a paradigm of vision that holds that it is outside the body, in the environment). His current research is twofold: to reverse the process of agent movement to generate design around social function (Ecomorphic design of environments), and to investigate spatial cognition through evolved neural-network control for the agents.
Teaching
Alasdair is course director of the MSc Adaptive Architecture & Computation. In the first term, his lectures cover an Introduction to Adaptive Architecture & Computation, and a module called Computing for Emergent Architecture, where students are given hands on access to a programming language developed especially for designers, Processing. In the second term he runs a more advanced Processing class, where students find out more about the underlying Java implementation. Under his supervision, students learn to use programming languages to generate interactive 3D worlds, implement shape grammars and evolutionary design, as well as agent-based visualisations. Over the summer, Alasdair tutors MSc projects related to his research from both the MSc Adaptive Architecture & Computation and MSc Advanced Architectural Studies.
Software
Alasdair is author of UCL’s Depthmap spatial analysis and pedestrian modelling software. The software incorporates Visibility Graph Analysis, axial line analysis and EVAS agents in one package. Academic licensing of the software is handled through Space Syntax Limited.
Alasdair has also written Pafweb to manage the VR centre webpages, as well as the Vision network content management system, along with (strictly in the "toys" category) a 3d social network viewer (requires Java).
Background
Alasdair holds an MA in Natural Sciences from the University of Cambridge, and an MSc in Artificial Intelligence from the University of Edinburgh.
Selected Publications
- Turner, A., 2003, Analysing the visual dynamics of spatial morphology. Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design 30:657–676
- Turner, A. and Penn, A., 2002, Encoding natural movement as an agent-based system: an investigation into human pedestrian behaviour in the built environment. Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design 29:473–490
- Turner, A., Doxa, M., O'Sullivan, D. and Penn, A., 2001, From isovists to visibility graphs: a methodology for the analysis of architectural space. Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design 28:103–121
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