The SCPTIPMFLIPPES (Strumento Cavo Per Traguardare Il Paesaggio Marittimo Fissando Labili Immagini Pronte Per Essere Sublimate) is a small project developed with 3d-printing technology, a device for viewing the maritime landscape. The coast is traditionally thought of as wild and pristine, but as activities and amenities from cities spread to the shoreline, a place that was once considered a refuge is becoming connected to everyday life. The SCPTIPMFLIPPES is a tool to isolate portions of maritime landscape, removed from the (visual) ground noise. The object is a pure geometric form, black, dug inside as if it had undergone the water erosion process.
SCPTIPMFLIPPES’s voids represent the visual cones, conceived as the solid volume, switching the figure-ground distinction: each cone refers to certain elements of the maritime landscape trapped into the black cube. Like an amber specimen preserving old insects and their ecosystem.
As the edge is 140mm wide, the device is optimized to suit a common 3D printer size and to be portable. It displays three different visual cones:
I) Monocular visual cone to watch the horizon line. Rectangular base featuring 10:1 ratio tapers to a circle with a 40° horizontal field of view angle.
II) Monocular visual cone to watch sole elements in the landscape. Circular base tapers to a circle 8 times smaller with a 20° field of view angle.
III) Periscope to watch without being watched. L-shaped cavity featuring a square section, the angle is designed to hold the mirror at an angle of 45°.
The black box is perfectly useless since does not let you record images or enlarge details. It simply concentrate your own field of view on what matters. It narrows the richness of information for the duration of a glimpse. The SCPTIPMFLIPPES is focused on the visual experience: 18th Century vedutisti used the camera obscura as medium to translate the infinite amount of visual information of a view in lines and colors. The act of framing is the way we use to subdue the nature, drawing a fence within human knowledge. The more a boundary is accepted (physically, legally, and conceptually) from the community, the more valuable it is.
The act of seeing is a form of passive resistance while man modifies continuously the natural. That witnessing changes, reflected in the built space, shows our shaping attitude making the landscape testimony of the relationship with it. The SCPTIPMFLIPPES can be used as semi-movable item to be sunk into the sand, giving value to a glimpse on the scenery.
The SCPTIPMFLIPPES identifies the value of a place before the site transforms.
Axonometric view of the SCPTIPMFLIPPES. Giuseppe Resta
SCPTIPMFLIPPES A device for viewing the maritime landscape
By (dp)ª STUDIO (Domenico Pastore, Giuseppe Resta)