The Golden Ratio

[andy]

Does anyone use it in their designs

[jfc]

Sounds like some made up salesman platter to me ;D

[cnc paul]

Andy,
I use it occasionally, If you use Sketchup is shows up when you stretch a rectangle.

What is you need ?


Paul

[andy]

The golden Ratio

No mate its real but do people use it / consider it in their designs or just gut feeling what looks proportionally right

[''The village idiot'']

Apr 27, 2008 18:08:48 GMT andy said:

Does anyone use it in their designs

Do you mean proportion? If you do then yes every day and in every design I do. Things need look right, with different parts in proportion with each other. A good indication of good proportion is an A4 sheet of paper or photos 10 x 8, 8 x 6 etc all these have a ratio of 1:125 approximately. ( 8 x 1.25 = 10 )

[cnc paul]

Golden Mean = 1.6180339887

[engineerone]

although i have not used it recently,it does have value

in particular if you have drawers showing, then they benefit from using the ratio in terms of sizes.

it is particularly valuable below the sight line since it draws your eye to a more pleasing line.

obviously you can't use it for doors for instance on a wall unit.

paul

[jfc]

Aaaahhhhhh you are talking about drawing things .... I just make em

[gazza]

Old Fibonacci , eh Andy
here

Apr 27, 2008 21:59:00 GMT jfc said:

Aaaahhhhhh you are talking about drawing things .... I just make em

Got it one mate ;D ;D
Andy, me thinks you've been reading too much Dan Brown ;D ;D
Cheers,
Gazza.

[TonyW]

Some links for those that are interested :
Golden Number
Youtube Video

This is a picture of Mike Wenzloffs Fibonacci Guage (I think!)



Can't see some of the gnarly old pros here bothering too much with it though ;D

Cheers ;D
Tony

[blacksheep]

I learned all about this at college and while I'm sure it has some merit when you are designing a stand-alone piece such as a coffee table or chest of drawers, when your daily work is filling alcoves with floor-to-ceiling cupboards it's a bit difficult to get away from the constraints placed upon you!

As Village Idiot says though, a sense of proportion is important but I tend to rely on my gut instinct for this rather than any mathematical formula. It hasn't let me down badly so far...



Cheers
Phil

[andy]

I was having a chicken or egg dilemma

ie do i draw a design which looks aesthetically pleasing and then check the dimensions to see if they need tweaking to conform to the golden ratio

or do I design to the golden ratio

[engineerone]

so put us out of our misery andy what are you designing???

then we can offer real advice ;D


paul

[oddsocks]

I've tried it in a number of designs but almost always then adjust for what looks right. I remember the oak bureau I did for my mother in law- I tried using it to position the drawer handles ....in the end I laid out the drawer fronts on the floor and moved the handles until they looked right (each drawer was a different height. but not quite to fibonacci). I had used the golden ratio as a start for the drawers themselves, but then practicalities such as hanging folder izess etc adjusted them - but only by the amount necessary.

with a blank sheet of paper the ratio is a good startign point, but fixtures such as handles and beading can influence it as far as the eye is concerned

[woodyew]

The Golden Ratio ?

Apr 27, 2008 18:08:48 GMT andy said:

Does anyone use it in their designs

I think I had a take away from them once?

[woodyew]

Apr 30, 2008 19:02:47 GMT andy said:

I was having a chicken or egg dilemma

Yup, I think that's what I had, very nice it was too. ;D

[mrgrimsdale]

It's a bit of a myth. Interesting though. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio
Some things look right in the golden ratio, others don't. If one bit fits, another won't.
Sash windows come in all shapes and sizes from over square to long and vertical, sometimes on the same facade. If the overall proportions fit the golden ratio, then the other bits such as pane sizes, won't. And vice versa - which means you can find it somewhere in any complicated rectangular design, by chance if not intentionally.
The Parthenon can be made to fit if you want it to, but it's not convincing.
The paper size thing en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paper_size is a different scheme altogether.

cheers
Jacob

[TonyW]

Someone might find this Fibonacci Flim Flam article of interest as the author dismisses some of the claims of what he calls "the lunatic fringe who look for mysticism in numbers"

On the other hand you may want to make your own Fibonacci guage plans for which can be found Here
and make up your own mind. Not enough polished brass knobs on this one for me ;D

FWIW my view is like Jacobs, some things look right others not so right

Cheers ;D
Tony

[Alf]

There was a flurry of excitement over Fibo-wotsit and the Golden Ratio amongst the 'Murrican fora last(?) year. I seem to recall an article in Popular Woodworking that claimed to demonstrate the presence of same in old furniture, but it seemed to me where the "magic number" was being measured from on each piece was so arbitary you could have claimed it was spelling out a message from Mars if you'd fancied to. It's okay as a starting point, but like others, I'd always plump for what looks right, not what the tape measure says. In fact I'm so unconvinced, LV's Phi Rules are about the only thing I've ever turned down for review.

Cheers, Alf

[tnimble]

What strikes me agian and again when people are truing to use it or analyse a piece how they go about it. Find a length multiply or divide by 1.6 and that is the other dimension or search for that size. This relation between lengths of 1.618.... is only valid for the large dimensions in a piece. For instance with a building the size of the height and the width of the building are about 1.6.

Designing with Fibonacci and Padovan sequences is not easy (esp Padovan, see also plastic number) is not about multiplying all your dimentions by a certain number and that's it. It has everything to do with analizing the piece, choosing root elements, and laying out and distributing the sequence. Product like the LV golden ratio ruler, the helper in the Sketchup square tool, etc are smart ideas/inventions but lack any practical use.

When you have designed a chest of drawers you can determine the height of the bottom drawer fom it's inset width, with a window you can use it for instance to get the height of the upper section in relation to the height of the lower, with a door you can use it to get the height of the panels. But that is it, any further usage will either distort the previous proportion or the next one.

The pantheon is fully designed by ratio (not counting the later adaptations to convert it into a church in the 18th century) from the outside shape, the size and location and number of polars, the sizes and number of coffers in the oculus, the tiles, locations of statues ad other decorations etc. so ae other buildings like the Alhambra, etc.