2. Digital bodies¶
✂︎Research & Ideation✂︎¶
After Anastasia's introductory lecture, my mind kept coming back to the idea of digital twins. I wasn't aware of brands such as The Fabricant, creating fashion for the digital world. I began thinking about how much of our self-expression and identities are bound up in how we construct our digital selves. For this reason, I began the week thinking about the idea of dopplegangers, avatars and the way technology changes the parameters of self-construction
- Holly Hendry, Gum Souls, 2019.-Thinking about cartoon and pedagogical depictions of the body.
- Yein Lee, status of for the time being, 2023.-Exploring the digital self.
- Terracotta, Anatomical Votives-The body's connection to ritual and the spiritual self.
- Tony Cragg, Body and Soul, 2022.- The body and self dichotomy.
- Katie Grinnan, Mirage, 2011-Thinking about multiplication.
- Christine Overad Hansen, Hard Coding, Soft Tactics,2021- The body becoming immaterial.
- Pakui Hardware, Creatures of Habit, 2017- The body's relationship to capital, labour and technology.
Similarly, this conversation between artists Holly Hendry and Rebecca Jagoe touches on the topic of Transi Tombs. These are funeral monuments characteristic of the Late Middle Ages that feature a tomb effigy of a decomposing body, often alongside a living depiction of the deceased. This served as a reminder of the inescapable link between death and life. I am interested in the duality of depictions in these monuments and how the body is depicted in the process of becoming immaterial... something I connect with the increasing pervasiveness of our digital bodies and lives.
I have been reading Doppleganger by Naomi Klein (2023) in which she discusses the "collective vertigo" we experience whilst living alongside our digital dopplegangers and extrapolates the consequences this has for our own control over our perception as the two converge. I got to thinking about the two headed Roman god Janus whom symbolises both beginnings and endings, openings and closings. His image is converging, merged and cyclical. To me, Janus has the feeling of a unescapable loop. With these thoughts I knew I wanted to play with merging and circular forms with my assignment this week.
My Sketchbook Pages, 2024.
✙Documentation Workflow✙¶
In the second week, our task was to learn how to use the 3D Scanner, 3D modelling software and the Laser Cutter to create something in response to the human body.
To do this we would:
- Generate a model of the human body using Make Human, an open source, graphic middleware used to create virtual humans.
- Generate 3D scans of our own bodies with the CR- Scan Ferret 3D Scanner from Creality.
- Modify and Repair these meshes in Rhinocerous 3D, a commercial CAD software.
- Slice our models and obtain a DXF file to laser cut with Slicer for Fusion 360
- Use the Laser cutter to engrave and cut the parts for our models ready for assembly.
Assignment Criteria: Week 2
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Include some inspirations: research on artists or projects that work with the human body
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Document the use of 3D scanner and softwares to acquire a 3D model
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Document the process of repairing and/or manipulating a 3D mesh and slicing it
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Create my ready to cut file for laser cutting, learn how to use the laser cutter and document the workflow and upload your 3D and 2D files
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Learn about the fab lab processes, booking system, usage, machine demos, tools and safety rules Build and/or assemble my mannequin, create a stop motion assembling it or stepped process
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EXTRA POINT Send one picture (HIGH RES) of my mannequin to enter the competition for the annual exhibition
Top Tip!!!
- Don't underestimate how long it takes to Lazer cut your design! Lazers aren't like they are in sci fi movies!
Inspiration!!!
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For super clear and detailed documentation Jiawen Gong
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For getting through trouble with Rhino Licenses and using Blender - Riley Cox
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For more great documentation- Olivia Cueva
Tools¶
- Make Human
- Rhino 8
- Blender
- Midjourney bot on Discord
- Creality Scan
- Slicer for Fusion 360
- Deep Nest
- Lightburn
- Laser Cutter
- CR- Scan Ferret 3D Scanner from Creality.
〠Make Human〠¶
As the name suggests, we used Make Human to generate a human body. This is a very intuitive interface which allows you to control the characteristics of the model using sliders. You can control many factors such as the age, proportions and gender of the model, as well as change the pose and expression.
For me, this was the simplest way to obtain a 3D model of a body. It was easy to export into Rhino 8 as an .obj file and then continue with augmenting and modifying the figure beyond the limits of Make Human.
☺︎3D Scanning☺︎¶
Rather than generating a virtual body, we also experimented with using 3D scanning to generate models of ourselves.
There are multiple way of 3D scanning:
- Photogrammetry
- Laser Scanning
- Contact Based
- Structured Light
But essentially, the 3D scanner sees the environment and collects point clouds. These are datasets that represent the X,Y,Z geometric co-ordinates of the point on a sample surface. These single spatial measurements can be collated into a dataset that describes a whole, which can be read and triangulated into polygon meshes or nurbs.
3D scanning is often a very costly solutions. I have linked other solutions below:
We were lucky enough to be able to play with the Fab Lab's new Toy: the Creality, CR-Scan Ferret 3D Scanner. This was paired with CrealityScan, a 3D scanning software which allowed us to clean and optimise our scans.
Our set up: 3D scanner, Creality Software on Mac and Green backdrop with rotating table.
It was important for us to prepare a good set up. We used a green background to avoid objects in the backgorund being picked up by the scanner. We also set up a rotating table covered with green fabric so that we could experiment with both rotating ourselves and the scanner to see which gave the best results.
Scanning in process, captured by Asli Aksan.
Videos taken by Asli Aksan.
When scanning it is important to go slowly and ensure the scanner is the correct distance from what you are scanning. As you scan the collected areas will turn green on the Creality Software screen. It will turn red and prompt you if you need to move closer or further away.
I frequently went too fast for the scanner and had to return to the last place it captured to continue. Similarly, it is important for the model to stay still to avoid glitches in the scan. Because of this modelling was definitely the hardest job.
We struggled with capturing areas of the body with undercuts such as under the chin and also the top of the head which meant that some of our scans were incomplete.
Once your scan is captured you are able to edit the scan and remove any unwanted elements. It is much easier to do this in Creality than in Rhino, you just have to select what you want to delete with the magic lasso. You can then start the process of optimising and deciding on the appropriate resolution for your scan:
We experimented with the one time optimisation button (circled in the first screenshot), but after considering the trade off between resolution, processing time and file size we decided it was best to keep the resolution low and sensitivity high, reduce the faces and denoise the scan. You can see how we edited this in the Optimisation and Mesh Settings above. This gave us a good scan and didn't take too long to process.
NOTE: Don't let your computer go to sleep during optimisation. We lost 2 scans this way!
Below are our experiments with different resolutions to see what we gained and lost:
Top: Lowest Poly Scan of Carolina. Below: Our highest Poly Scan of Carolina
Our final scan was my favourite, myself and Carolina wanted to do a pose that incorperated both our bodies. Asli kindly scanned us (the pro!)and we used our perfected optimisation settings. We lost some details in the undercuts but it was a great experiment in the kind of detail and shapes you can capture with 3D scanning.
⚒︎Rhino 8⚒︎¶
Once we had obtained a mesh we could move into Rhinocerous 3D (a CAD software) to modify and repair it. I choose to use a very generic mesh of a human body generated using Make Human because I didn't want as much detail as the 3D scanner picked up.
I exported the Make Human model as a DXF file into Rhino 8
We were first given a tutorial in the basics of using Rhino 8 from the absolute expert Asli Aksan.
She explained to us the basic interface including the command bar, viewports and axis and how to move around in them.
Then we learnt basic commands such as Move, Copy, Rotate, Scale and Mirror. She also showed us how to make planar surfaces and solids and explained the difference between Nurbs, Meshes and Sub Ds.
Most importantly for us she explained the Boolean commands and how to repair our meshes. These tools will allow us to slice up our meshes, join them and repair them.
Using tools such as Boolean split we were able to start chopping up our digital bodies and designing our sculpture:
Using the Fill All Holes and Select Open Meshes commands we were able to see if there were any open meshes and close them:
I began to play with split hands and half of heads to explore the idea of the Digital Twin I had in my head
And then I used the copy, rotate and Arraypolar tool to multiply the hands and heads and merge them in wonderful ways:
I ended up with this final design:
It took some time to close this mesh. Asli worked very hard trying to close the gaps left by Make Human where the eyes and mouth are. Eventually we came to a good solution: using a Mesh Ellipse to fill the hole in the mouth and then Boolean union the solid with the head. The Ellipse shape is perfect as it lets you modify its shape in many directions to fill the gap:
This was my final design which I exported as a .OBJ file to take into Slicer 360 for fusion:
This model is downloadable as an .obj file from Sketchfab1
✁Slicer For Fusion 360✁¶
In Slicer for Fusion 360 you can choose how you would like your model to be sliced. You can customise the material so you can find out how many sheets of material you will need.
Slicer generates the file you can take to the lazer cutter.
You can change the direction in which your model is sliced. I chose a slight angle to create some difference between the two heads. I though this better conveyed my idea of digital twins and also made the slices look like a faulty display on a screen.
It also mocks up the assembly process so that you can check your model will hold together and be easy to construct.
Overall this was a simple and rewarding process and I enjoyed seeing all the possibilities with my one model.
You can then take your lazer cutting file as a .DXF file into Rhino to join the lines and nest your pieces to avoid any waste material. Again export this as a DXF file and take to the lazer cutter. You can find my nested laser cutting file as a pdf in the footnoted 2.
❁Lasercutting❁¶
TO THE LAZER CUTTER!!
This is the laser cutter in the Fablab! You can find the Waag Futurelab's walk through here but I have included the useful diagram they included below:
The tutorial we were given by Asli was a perfect mixture of demonstration and doing. By the end of the day I felt my confidence using this daunting machine increase massively and I'm excited by what is possible with it in the future.
I have made a quick laser cutter checklist below to help remember those little but ESSENTIAL steps:
We ran a couple tests and the machine settings we used for cutting 3mm thick corrigated cardboard were:
ENGRAVE: Speed: 150 mm/sec Max Power (%): 15 Min Power (%): 12
CUT: Speed: 45 mm/sec Max Power (%): 30 Min Power (%): 20
We had trouble at the start because we set the min power too low. This caused the corners to disappear on our engravings because min power controls the power of the cut when it is turning a corner. We made sure to increase this for our final settings and had great results.
Many hours later we were finished cutting! Please remember that cutting takes a long time and don't underestimate how long you need to leave so you don't keep your instructors from their precious friday night! However, we did manage to fill our hours watching the machine with fun and we enjoyed pancakes as it was of course my lasercutting birthday party!
✌︎Construction✌︎¶
Constructing the pieces was SO much fun. It was a very meditative process... if a bit sticky. The assembly instructions from Slicer for Fusion 360 were very easy to follow, all you had to do was line up the engraved marks. The only issue I had was making sure I didn't get glue on the parts that could be seen. I will think about this more next time.
♛Outcome♛¶
Overall, I am really happy with my final outcome. I think it conveys my inital idea clearly and I love that the angle I sliced it at means that there is slight differences between the two heads. I am experimenting with different display methods. I would like to find a way to wall mount it or perhaps show it flat on the floor.
⑀Compel the Head to Eat the Tail⑀¶
by Isobel Jo Leonard¶
