3d Athens Meetup 2026 – From Rapidograph to AI: Reflections on a Changing Profession

Last Wednesday I had the pleasure of speaking at 3D Athens Meetup 2026 — an evening brought together by Creative Lighting, Design Ambassador, Archisearch, and sponsored by Chaos. A room full of architects, visualizers and designers who genuinely care about where this profession is heading.

My talk traced a journey I know well: from my father’s drawing office in the late ’70s — rapidograph pens, rice paper, no Undo button — through the first overnight renders on early computers, to where we are today with AI-generated imagery.

A lot has changed. But the question I kept returning to is: who is in control?

At Bobotis+Bobotis Architects, we’ve always held one principle: you don’t design architecture according to your technical capabilities. The design leads. The tool follows. That applies whether the tool is a rapidograph, a 3D modelling suite, or an AI image generator.

AI is powerful. We use it in our office. But what I see filling Instagram — beautiful renders with no human thought behind them, spaces designed for the scroll rather than for the person who will live or work in them — is a warning sign. The speed of scrolling hides it, but look carefully: in most of those images, the human element is missing.

Architecture must develop around human presence. That responsibility doesn’t transfer to the tool.

A big thank you to Nikos Nikolopoulos and the 3D Athens team — and to everyone who was in the room that evening for the conversation that followed.