Interaction Design, Facial Mocap, Mixed Reality |
Individual Project, Fall 2018 |
Liquid Avatar is a visual and interaction design of futuristic digital avatars. This project focuses on the process of crafting/customization and how we might connect with these liquid avatars that blend the physicality and virtuality.
In the Digital Era, where virtual is getting more real, digital celebrities who are born and raised by the Internet and social media start to have a strong impaction on people. On the other side, Apple, Snapchat, Snow launched their products of customizable personal avatar. There is a demand for the digital representative of individuals, which is my starting point for this project.
Starting from the filed of live streaming, I've been exploring more about self-expression from different groups of culture and aesthetics. With my strong interest in facial expression, I figured out that some of the streamers have been using virtual avatars to represent themselves in various game streaming. Comparing with the fact that all the avatars always look unreal, the more important thing to the audiences is that there is a real person puppeteering the virtual mask behind the scene.
Inspired by the Instagram and Youtube phone deco videos, it encourages users to build their own identity via crafting their clay avatar. Besides, it provides a playful interaction where you can use your front and back camera to do facial motion capture and project it on another person's clay avatar. One of the exciting explorations includes the notion of a fuzzy result of the photogrammetry technique that serves as an analog in (reading) and out (rewriting) of the physical object.
Image from the video clip where these two avatars surfing on social media and get many likes.