The Graphics Technology Tsunami
By James O. Pennock

I don’t think there were many people in the world that did not see the horrible action and aftermath of the Japanese Tsunami that occurred in early March 2011. That Tsunami happened on one specific day and took only a short time to do its damage. It gave us all a truly frightening look at the effect of an unstoppable, irresistible and irreversible force. Japan will never be the same again and the loss of livelihood will forever affect that country.
There has been a “Tsunami” of sorts in the engineering and design profession as well. This Tsunami has, so far taken more than thirty years and it is not done yet. This Tsunami is the growth in graphics technology that has washed over all areas of the engineering, design and “drafting” fields. This rising tide has also proven to be an unstoppable, irresistible and irreversible force.
In this Graphics Tsunami there have also been causalities. These causalities are not the actual death of a human. It is however the death of expertise, the death of quality, the death of pride, the death of dedication and the loss of desire to train others in the craft. How did this happen? Why did this happen? Simple! It is human nature. It is as predictable as starting a small snow ball rolling down a hill. It gains size; it gains momentum and soon becomes an unstoppable force.
Digital Graphics is a great invention. The companies that created the graphics went looking for a market so they could sell this new product. They found many and among them was the process plant engineering and design companies. These companies were told that Graphics was the best thing since sliced bread and will save a lot of money. The engineering companies tried it out. In the meantime the graphics companies went to the people who are the Clients of the engineering companies and sold them on how great this new thing is and they should require it for all their projects. Companies got greedy. Management pushed the systems onto the work force. Management believed the sales hype that these graphics “Do all the things that your present staff does” and “it does it faster and cheaper”.
The Tsunami wave rolled in. It decimated the training budgets in every company who cared and who had developed ongoing training system that fed the stream of expertise. Quality was the next victim to go. There was no one who understood that the computer is a dumb machine that is ruled by the God “GIGO” (Garbage In= Garbage Out). They (the Graphics companies and engineering company management) believe that the computer is right because it is “programmed”.
Young inexperienced designers now are given only a few hours of basic training on how to run the graphics computer. They were not taught “Piping” so there is no pride in what they are doing. They are just manipulating the graphics and collecting a paycheck. With no pride in what they are doing there is no dedication to doing it right.
Yes, there are still a few of the “old timers” around, but they are normally not allowed to train the inexperienced workers. As a result they see the lack of quality and lack of pride and the lack of dedication and they in turn are disenchanted about what they are doing. They gravitate to a mode of hoping they can hold onto their jobs until it is time for them to retire. What a waste of talent and knowledge. This industry will never be the same again and the loss of skilled professionals will forever affect future projects.
The graphics Tsunami rolls on and there is nothing you or I can do to stop the flow. There is nothing you or I can do to change the direction or reverse the flow. We are all now just spectators watching a television screen as it broadcasts the affects and results of the carnage.

James, I have so many thoughts about what you've written. I too started out on the boards many years ago. Endless practicing of lettering and doing list drawings before I was permitted to backfix an arrangement drawing. I thought I had arrived when I was assigned an entire drawing revision to do.
Later in my career, I saw people assigned to develop arrangements after a 3 month training course. I discovered that it was all about the pretty pictures that the computers could churn out instead of a designer really understanding the ins and outs of what they were doing and why. It all became more engineer-driven and us designers were cordially invited to keep our mouths shut and just do what we were told. Quoting specifications to an engineer was the kiss of death.

It was a different time then. Now, there's a bunch of "CAD jockeys" but very few real designers left. That's one of the many reasons I've left the shipbuilding industry. I was tired and burnt out at the time. To be told "I don't care what the specs say, this is what I WANT" by an engineer fresh out of school who didn't know forward, aft, port and starboard was hard to take.

I've posted this before (somewhwere), but it's still applicable...

I seem to remember a history class where the teacher was telling us about the “Industry Revolution of the 1890’s”. He was saying that before that time a “furniture shop” could fabricate a piece of furniture at a rate of one or two pieces a week. This furniture was a quality piece and the cost of this furniture was high. Then the industrial revolution hit, the same shop now generated 24 pieces of furniture a week with the help of time saving machinery, the quality wasn’t as good, but the price was reduced, and they didn’t have to have the “craftsmen” they did before. So now a “poorer quality” product was produced, and sold to the public. This poorer quality was generally acceptable because of the reduced cost and speed of production.
SO fast forward to the 1980’s, now the “computer revolution” has pokes its head into things with computer aided drafting! Now it’s a whole new/different way to do drawings, unfortunately this caused alot of the Sr. people in design/drafting to opted to retire early (plus a major down turn in the economy) as appose to have to learn a new way of doing their job. Now it has become more important as to what computer program you know and developing your computer capabilities as apposed to developing your designer skills. This goes on this way for about 20 to 25 years.
Present day - these days 3D is the “optimumal” way to document projects! …Why? …Because with 3D you generate a “picture” where it doesn’t require anybody to be ability to “read” a technical drawing. Projects are done 3D to produce “pictures” (with shading in some cases) and these are passed out for construction. This is done because the young engineers & cheaper welders don’t read drawings too well and do better with pictures! This is the reason us “older guys” (those that have worked on the board and have the ability to read drawings) have heart ache with this whole thing. When I was taught mech. & piping drafting, it was hammered into you that your drawings WILL LOOK one way! That doesn’t happen these days. What these computer programs put out would be unacceptable pre-1985 …they DO NOT follow accepted drafting standards & convention! SO WHY are they acceptable now!?? Like the Industrial Revolution of the early 1900’s “craftsmanship” is NOT a requirement anymore, a product is now generated by lesser knowledgeable people (a good percentage by 3rd world nations, working for 10% of the pay) at a cheaper price and a quality product is now replace with something that is deemed as “good enough”! …Just another case of history repeating itself!