Becoming Hatsune MikuA deep dive into the crowd-sourced community of Hatsune Miku, a voice synthesizer branded as a virtual pop idol, and what it can teach us about the power of hybrid physical/virtual and individual/collective identity to mobilize rigid imagery. At its core, this thesis is a celebration of a digital community as strange and unique as the contemporary landscape it perseveres through.

This project is part physical, part digital, and part in-between. The content includes an essay exploring these topics, two interviews with members of the community, and a glossary of references to navigate the sprawling Miku universe.




Part 1: Book & Figure

This figure uses the body as a site of discourse to explore how the seamless fantasy of Miku’s image becomes increasingly fluid through her hybrid nature. Using a combination of 3D scanning & printing technology, I repeatedly translate my own body clad in a shoddy Miku costume between digital and material spheres. The resulting 3D printed figurine is full of glitchy artifacts that exist in this hybrid digital-physical space. In the language of anime figurine packaging, the 1/6 scale figurine lives in a custom cut display on the cover of a book case, which houses a scroll-like accordion version of the writings in print.

Documentation in progress.

Part 2: Website

This website is the central conclusion of this project, integratating my writing with my visual explorations. The model of my 3D scan becomes a navigation system in which the body metaphors of HTML tags are flipped back onto the human figure. Image superimposes type in homage to the scrolling user comments characteristic of Vocaloid videos. Centrally, a citation system allows the user to create a personal archive, or “playlist,” of relevant references to explore later.

Documentation in progress.
essay format
navigation system
citation system