The Many Faces of Kevin Staszowski

This project represents the second phase of my Robolab artifact; an idea I came across while presenting my original design A Mask with A Thousand Faces. During that presentation, I realized that my first mask was actually a sum-of-parts, rather than a coherent artifact. What I mean is that I spent a lot of time designing the mechanics of the Lego drive system, to create a clever gear system and a structurally sound artifact. I tried to create a sophisticated Robolab program that required me to learn some new programming functions. Finally, the mask I made require me to pull out much of the art supplies I'd put aside when entering graduate school; each of the objects used in the original mask had deep personal meaning and related to people I felt close with during that time. I built each portion of my project with an intention - but not with the same intention during each phase of the project. I fell prey to the problem of fighting with my materials rather than working with it.

After realizing what I'd done, I started thinking about a unifying idea for my project. Since I'd already created my original 'profound' object - there was less pressure to make something earth-shattering. If I created something new, great; if I didn't, I still had my original design to be proud of.

My original mask was supposed to show the many facets that a mask could take on, reflecting my view that masks don't hide the identity of the user, rather masks allows certain passive aspects of the personality to come forth and take dominance. For a real world example of this, I turn to the pictures of myself I store on my computer. When I was making my website for CD143, I realized I had few, if any, pictures of me not wearing a mask (or at least some sort of costume) Whether intentionally or not, I didn't want to preserve the everyday Kevin; I wanted to preserve the very different Kevin - Kevin the actor, the scary Kevin, the Kevin the father. My self-pictures were actually pictures OF friends - friends I'd communicate with regularly but friends that only came into view once I put a mask on.

This concept is what I used as inspiration while creating non-Lego masks in the past, I would try to get in touch with the 'feeling' that I felt was important about the person I was making the mask for or the 'emotion' I wanted to express. When I created a good connection, the mask's I'd design would turn out amazingly well. On the other hand, I also recall trying to make a mask without feeling and the mask coming out decidedly rotten.

So, with the intention of 'masks as a means of changing dominate personality traits', I set forth to create a new mask for CD 143. While sitting in a meeting, I sketched the following idea on a note card....

This simple sketch depicted three moving parts. The center rectangle was a set of masks I owned (more on that below). The two X's labeled 'eyes' would have pictures of my eyes at each end of the x. I would take pictures of my eyes expressing different emotions; happiness, sadness, anger, and reflection. (I had toyed with the idea of taking pictures of my family's eyes and attaching them - but my goal was to show how different aspects of my personality came out from behind the mask.) The small rectangle at the bottom of the picture labeled 'lips?' would be another spinning part that that would take the expression of my lips (and, potentially, nose) in happiness, sadness, anger, and reflection and bring that forward in the mask.

I liked this idea and decided, if I had time, to try to create it. The first step was taking pictures of myself - both wearing masks and expressing emotions.

In the interest of web space, I didn't put the pictures of me expressing emotions on to this web site specifically. As for masks, here are the specifics relating to each mask that became part of the final design.

This mask is from Bali and was picked up by my best friend while he was traveling through that part of the world. The mask would be used in one of the larger festivals held in Bali; the person wearing this mask would play the role of the slow-witted sidekick to the straight-man story teller. I've worn this mask when I've wanted to catch people off guard. While not necessarily scary, the mask is grotesque and people tend to reflect on the mask, trying to decide whether they like it or not.

This mask is a simple copy of a Venetian 'Commedia Del Arte' Mask. Commedia Del Arte was a early form of improvisational theatre. Actors would learn characters, not parts, and would create shows based on audience suggestions. The actors would act as their character and, using stock physical comedy scenes called lazzis, would perform a unique and original show for the audience. Every Commedia Del Arte characters (the lover, the warrior, the scoundrel, the seducer) would have a specific, consistent mask worn by that character in all acting troops. This mask is significant to me because one of the favorite acting experiences I've had is playing the role of the warrior (Capitano) in a commedia del arte show.

I built this mask myself to show someone that a broken mirror didn't necessarily mean bad luck. The picture doesn't do the mask justice - the multi-angled mirrors that adorn the mask make the whole thing glitter when light hits it. Many people have borrowed this mask from me for costumes but I've always gotten it back (unlike other masks I've created) from them after the fact. In one way, the mirrors represent the many different users of the mask reflecting through the overall vision what the mask represents.

After I had all these mask pictures, I set forth to create my rotating mask. Herein lies the first integration of ideas that sets this design apart from my original mask. When I first printed each mask picture - I made the pictures roughly the size of an 8.5"x11" piece of paper. During the Lego design phase, trying to create a spinning base for these pictures was nearly impossible. So I though about the situation and decided that the size of the pictures of the masks weren't important - it was how the masks integrated with the other portions of the project. So, I shrunk my pictures down to one-fourth of their original size. This aided the design process immensely.

The actual design of the mask is very simple. Two connected motors spin the Xs with the pictures of my eyes. One motor spins a Lego water-wheel that has my lips on it (I decided against using my nose, since I could give the lips and the nose both clearance from the other moving parts and translation onto the mask.) The last motor spins the 4 pictures of me wearing masks.

One of the nice advantages of making the pictures smaller is that I had more room on the Lego panel for clearance. As you can see from this overhead shot, I put a good amount of space between each moving part - a lesson learned from my original mask. Also, because the mask is designed to be viewed from the front, there is an illusion of the eyes, mouth, and mask being on the same plain.

This picture depicts another change I made in the design during the construction phase - blank features. Thinking about my original concept, I realized that sometimes a mask doesn't have any underlying emotions behind it - its just worn as its own identity. So, I removed the emotion of anger from the lineup.

Removing the anger emotion, however, had another interesting effect - it made the Xs fall out of balance. I had to counter weight the Xs to make sure the Xs would spin at the same rate (and wouldn't shift to a less-desirable (but more balanced) state when the motor was off.)

Also notice the evolution of design: in my note card picture, I had the Xs mounted on a frame in front of the rotating mask. I realized that this frame was unnecessary and only served as another obstacle for the moving parts to catch on. I could make the Lego structurally as strong as I needed without the framing on top.

This larger top view shows the other issue I had to contend with - wiring the motors. I original used long wires for each motor, but those wires would get caught in the gears while the motor was spinning. So, I uses many small wires linked together; the smaller wires allowing me to lock the wires down to the base-plate at strategic points to prevent catching within the system.

The program for this mask is shown below....

The program runs as follows

	Before the program begins, the first central mask shown to the user is a blank one. None of my facial features are translated onto this mask.
	When the program starts, the central mask rotates from the first to the second mask. The central mask will rotate every two minute OR when the furthest right light sensor detects a 50 percent increase in brightness. This increase in brightness would represent someone not paying attention to the mask - so the mask would shift to draw more attention to itself. The central mask can only spin in one direction (counter-clockwise) - the pictures get caught on the motor otherwise.
	While the central mask rotates, so do the emotion-expressing eyes and mouth shift. The first transition occurs 45 seconds after the program begins . The first facial expression, sadness, appears on the mask and stays there until there is a change in brightness in a second light sensor. This brightness change represents how one mask can illicit different emotions in different observers.
	This picture depicts the happy emotional state. In this incarnation of the mask, the eyes and mouth are locked together (i.e. you won't have a happy mouth with sadness eyes), but a slight modification of the program could randomize each feature easily.
	This final picture depicts the reflective emotional state. Notice how all the features appear to be on the same plain when viewed from the front

Another aspect to the program (the top branch) is keyed to a touch-sensor. Pressing the touch sensor causes all the features of the mask to spin around quickly before the program shuts down. Since this involves motion, it is hard to show in a static photo.

Postscript:

What I also found interesting about this second mask is the amount of time it took me to complete. I spent about 3 hours from beginning to end on this second mask, including programming, taking the pictures, and making the Lego structure. I spent at 2 hours alone trying to integrate the moving parts of my original mask so that the pieces wouldn't catch on each other while spinning. Additionally, without intending too, I learned 2 new functions in Robolab (the all-stop icon, the proper layout of the wait until function).

In this design, it was an interest in a concept that motivated me rather than an interest in the medium. The program isn't that complex, nor is the Lego design that ingenious - but the pieces fit together a lot better than my first design. I also feel that this mask represents the idea 'masks as a means of changing dominate personality traits'. The central masks shift depending on who is walking by, or how long its been since the mask had changed. The features brought forth in the mask (represented by the eyes and mouth) also change depending on the person watching the mask - representing that one mask might be able to relate different emotions, depending on who is viewing it.