Differential Growth – Animations in Grasshopper 3D
Johanna Schmidtke

Differential growth describes a form of growth that can be seen in various plants, animals and fungi. The cells divide faster in certain places than in others, usually at the edge of an object, causing the edge to curl up.
There are plug-ins for Grasshopper 3D that can simulate this form of growth. The goal of my semester project was to use the topic of growth to explore the possibilities of Grasshopper 3D. To achieve results that are as nature like as possible, I had to think about many different parameters. Towards the end of the semester, I also got to work with V-Ray, a rendering program that can be used within Grasshopper. I experimented with textures, lighting, background and camera movements. The results are animations, GIFs and a basic understanding of node-based and computational design.