Fall 2024 | AI Explorations via Strata Springs
Nestled against the boldly striped rocky hills of South Eastern Utah is our design of Strata Springs - a dreamy wellness resort.
It is the perfect place to relax after a long day hiking in Arches National Park.
One hour south of Moab, the 160-acre property known as Big Indian boasts the captivating “White Rock” - a site of spiritual allure. Additionally, the property listing features an existing siteplan showing the potential for hosting dispersed villas.
Drawing inspiration from the rock formation and its unique stripes, Strata Springs celebrates the land through the use of rammed earth construction and portal like forms.
We started by gathering and generating inspiration imagery via Pinterest and Midjourney AI.
Programatically, Strata Springs circles White Rock with private villas and is centered around an Amenity Village featuring hot springs, four pools, a spa, and a resturaunt. Circulation paths around the resort terminate at pavillions for Meditation and Yoga.
The above illustration was generated via Sketchup Diffusion. Earlier this year, Sketchup launched a built-in “rendering engine” that uses AI to turn Sketchup scenes into more aesthetically pleasing shots. While captivating, Sketchup Diffusion takes a lot of creative liberties, and doesn’t do a very good job at preserving existing geometry nor details.
The image above is a Sketchup Diffusion render showcasing the proposed arrival experience at Strata Springs. Here, guests are encouraged to drop off their bags, change into bathing suits and follow a winding path to the rejuvenating main hot spring pool.
However, as seen in the Sketchup Model export below, Diffusion completely erases this winding path.
After settling our design, we decided to focus on generating vignettes for important spaces, using our traditional tools of 3dsMax and Corona.
At Strata Springs, the lobby invites guests to immerse themselves in the soothing hot waters upon arrival, offering an immediate escape from the hustle and bustle of the outside world.
Guests are transported to their villas by golf cart, where a long, water flanked path encourages them to slow down and embrace the present moment.
Inside the villa, guests are immersed in one-of-a-kind experiences, from a dome-shaped bedroom carved into the rock to a private shower garden with a plunge pool and an oversized rain shower. Strata Springs offers moments of unforgettable luxury and natural beauty.
AI Animation Explorations
AI Animation Programs, like Runway ML, are providing AI video generation with multitudes of experimental features. In supplying just the first and/or last frame, AI can generate all the frames needed to animate up to 5 seconds.
It can also introduce visual effects in animations, albeit poorly, and with little ability to control them.
In the above clip, we explored asking AI to add “Steam” to the animation. While initially impressed that the steam can interact with the architecture of the room, controls gave little ability to adjust its location, color, or action leading to an unusable animation.
We also experimented with using AI to animate people in our shots. While the potential is exciting, the lack of precise controls poses significant challenges in achieving the desired results. We were unable to control the person from disappearing below the water.
While far from perfect, check out our AI Animation of Strata Springs above.
Conclusion
While Runway ML showcases exciting potential for animating still imagery, several quality concerns remain:
Video is unable to export higher than 720 x 1080.
Text-based prompting offers little precision. It is difficult to control the video’s style, details, effects, and movement.
Architectural Elements and Furniture are not preserved. Often times, new elements appear, or some go missing altogether.
Despite these challenges, tools like Runway ML represent a groundbreaking step forward in leveraging AI to transform static visuals into dynamic, immersive experiences. We are excited to keep testing them to see what is possible!
