Towards a “Leonardo da Vinci approach” of GIS for Spatial Design

At the very beginning of the 1990s, a student happened to use a pen in a pen plotter that was smaller than the required size to fit the holder, which produced squiggle line drawings very similar to hand-generated plots. Taking advantage of this “accidental” discovery, and so as to establish the impact of this “technique,” Van Bakergem and Obata decided to voluntarily use this particular process to produce various plots, and to show them to architects and architecture students in order to test their respective reactions. Two sets of pen plotted perspective drawings were presented. The first set was printed with precise lines, and the second one revealed the results of the “new technique” simulating hand-sketching. The first set was judged as a final closed image that dampens creative ideas; whereas the second one was considered as interesting and stimulating. This experiment gave birth to a new technique for producing non-photorealistic images from photorealistic images.