Alter Egos
2023
Alter Egos is both an interactive installation and a performance art piece in which each participant becomes the performer. Developed using Touchdesigner, this piece uses body tracking to generate a digital version of anyone that interacts with it. This alter ego replicates movements made by the participant over and over, while constantly getting faster and more distorted. The goal is for the participants to try to keep up with their digital self.
Installation
Interactive
Touchdesigner
The installation employs Torin Blankensmith and Dom Scott’s MediaPipe plugin to constantly keep track of the participants. It then uses this data as input to create both a segmentation of the person’s body, which displays the participant’s movements in real time, and a slightly distorted and animated silhouette, which initially also follows the participant in real time, but later it decouples from them and starts repeating a series of movements previously performed by the participant.
If the participant tries to replicate the alter ego’s movements, it will be initially easy, since they are displayed at a reduced speed, but as the interaction goes on, these movements become harder and harder to replicate as the playback speed constantly increases. This serves a metaphor for how trying to fit high expectations can eventually become impossible and lead to burnout.