Self-Portrait

Word Self-Portrait
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation

Self-Portrait is an interactive media installation I worked on with Wei-Hao Wang where participants generate self-portraits through the words that they speak. Viewers are prompted to respond to questions asked of them “Tell me a secret,” “Tell me a lie,” etc. As the viewers speak into the microphone fixed to the wooden control panel, their words appear on the screen and become mapped to their face. The more that they share the higher the resolution becomes of their portrait. Once finished, viewers can print their response from a thermal printer in the control panel.

Self-Portrait is comprised of a wooden control panel, microphone, webcam, computer monitor, web browser, microcontroller, and thermal printer. Wei and I used javascript APIs for natural language processing and facial recognition functionality, and a microcontroller to register inputs from the control panel and outputs to the thermal printer. Self-Portrait was selected for the RISD 2019 MFA Graphic Design Biennial, On the Edge of Normal, in the Sol Koffler Gallery.

Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Word Self-Portrait
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Thermal Print of Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Man staring at self-portrait in computer screen
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Word Self-Portrait
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Person interacting with Self-Portrait installation
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait
Word Self-Portrait