Mike's page

01:

What:
“Lucy Skull” is a 3d printed sculpture I created in 2011. The basis of the sculpture consists of a scan of a skull where the scan data is reduced and simplified, so that the form of the skull becomes a more abstracted, low-polygon, faceted surface. The skull is then duplicated multiple times. Each duplicate is progressively scaled and rotated, with each copy overlapping the other. The skull starts at life size facing in one direction, then through a series repeated transformations the scale of the skull becomes double in size and facing in the opposite direction. The intermediate copies form a bridge between the two end points in a mess of overlapping, jutting, triangular forms.

How:
One of the initial inspirations for the start of this project was being sent a picture from a friend who was having dental work done. My friend’s dentist had created a detailed 3d scan of her teeth using a scanner that works much like a MRI machine. The scan created a detailed and accurate 3d model of her bones and teeth (in other words, her skull). I asked her to request a copy of the data of the scan so that I might play around with the digital model of her skull. Around the same time I was invited to create a new work for an exhibition of 3d printed artworks curated by artist Eric Van Straaten. This exhibition provided an opportunity to turn the data from the scan into an artwork.

Why:
As the exhibition was focused on digital fabrication technology in general and 3d printing in particular I wanted to create a sculptural work that would have been exceedingly difficult to create by more analog means. The intersecting surfaces, precisely scaled repeating forms both in visual language and technical form reveal the “digitialness” of the sculpture. The skull as the source material is also a uniquely digital form which could previously only be captured from a dead subject.

02:
What:
"Still Life” is a 3d animated short film consisting of high resolution 3d scans of various foodstuffs set against brightly colored backdrops. Presented in a series of scenes, the foodstuffs behave in strange ways. They undergo many different deformations; collapsing, inflating, deflating, and colliding with one another. The film juxtaposes realistic renderings of real-world objects with surreal physically simulated movements that emulate the properties of rubber and fabric. The animation is set a soundtrack of electronic music composed for the piece by Dylan Galletly. How:
The film came to be through an ongoing fascination in the ways that physical forms are translated and transformed into the digital realm. I have interest in how 3d animation technologies are often highly focused on the “accurate” depiction of real-world phenomena. 3d scanning in particular is often presented as way of achieving maximum realism in 3d graphics. In this animation I combined this interest in technological forms with an equal interest in older forms of representing the real world, namely still life painting. What attracts me to still life paintings is how the paintings can study of form of their subject but also how they reveal much about how they are made. The quality and materiality of paint exist on equal footing with the study of light, color and form.

Why:
In this animation I was focused on how 3d models are essentially shells, rather than physical forms that have volume. By having the forms repeatedly collapse upon themselves, the hollowness of the digital source material can be revealed. I took inspiration from the term of Still Life itself, by focusing on the idea of stillness. I also took inspiration from how the term is expressed in French as “Nature Morte,” which can be literally translated to dead nature. In this animation the stillness and deadness of these virtual objects becomes the focus of the piece.

03:
What:
Parametric Portraits is a series of 5 seamlessly looping portrait format 3d animations depicting animated figures that enact struggling movements. The 3d model of the figures are faceted and rough in surface, their surfaces are sometimes distorted in extreme ways. The surfaces of the figures are rendered in stark white with red shadows and are set against a bright blue backdrop. The figures are driven by motion capture data. Both facial motion capture and full body motion capture are used, movements from different actors and sources are often combined into single sequences. How:
The series was a continuation of an earlier 3d animated work “Parametric Expression” which used a library of preset library of facial expressions from 3d character generator software as the basis of the work. In “Parametric Expression” the uncanniness and strangeness of these pre-existing models was my main interest. This new series expands on that work, but instead focuses on data captured from real people. Both the data sources and the models they are applied to are imperfect, no effort is made to hide the imperfections and translation errors that are introduced in capturing and applying the data. Why:
In this piece I was interested in seeing what essence of a person still remains when their movements are captured and then translated to avatars which are not perfectly natural in appearance. By converting the captured movements and expressions into seamless loops they become impossible forms that can endlessly repeat in ways that the physical counterparts they are sampled from never could. Emotions and expressions become streams of data, that can be copied and transmitted an infinite amount of times, but in that process they become corrupted and transformed into something new.