Serial Cybrog  | Nathan Wade | 2008



The concepts

Serial Cyborg is a DICOM MRI/CT scan based wood sculpture, cut by an industrial CNC mill.

The sculpture explores persistent physical distortion with a simple gestural movement; through the process of scanning an individual we can literally disassemble the human body into a virtual database and explore serialization of organic movement through the eyes of a machine. High resolution 3D objects are generated from the resonance images, and sequenced in virtual space. The form is composed of the head and shoulders at skeletal, vascular and muscular resolutions derived from the original MRI scan alternating between the three incrementally from left to right as the head rotates over time.  As a final step the sculpture is re-cut back into pysical space by a computer-numerical
-contolled industrial mill percisly as it was scanned, allowing us to adress the object on our own terms while underlining the idea of persistant distortion through physical space.
The final form is a one-to-one scale of the original data, with artistic intervention found only in concept and sequencing of the slices; through the eyes of the machine, cut by the machine.

This artwork also aims to explore the notion of the modern human as Cyborg, augmented and abstracted through technology while engaging hybrid human definition. The synthesis of digital revealing and informing the physical, irrevocably altering both as extension of the other.

Realization of serialized motion is further heightened through interaction with an open lighting system;
a battery of halogen lights forming a parameter, actuated by a microcontoller, relays and state logic.
Download Video of the prototype interaction.

This object is soundly rooted in the artistic practices of Cubism, Futurism and Sculptural Serialism. Refrencing some of the ideas explored by Ducham's "Nude Decending no. 40" and Boccinolli's “Unique forms in the continuity of space” among others.




Some Technical Information

DICOM MRIs are high resolution scans composed of images in the XYZ directions. They come from large resonance machines found in modern medical facilities. The source file for this project contained 460 slices in each direction.

A Screenshot of the flat DICOM MRI showing XYZ slices


Using radiology visualization software the slices can be interpreted into a high resolution 3D object based on flesh dencity. Models were generated at the muscular, vascular and skeletal levels for the final piece.

One of the orginal voxel images extracted from the MRI data. This object contains about 10,000,000 vertex points


The models are then manipulated in virtaul space, creating the final serialized form.

The processed voxel form that the final sculpture was generated from, front and back


In virtual space the model is then split into 300 thin vertical slices. Each slice is individually exported and processed into G-Code using CAM software. G-Code is a scripting language that defines feed rates, profile offsetes, plunge and movment commands used to drive the CNC machine's cutting head based on tooling and stock.

Two random profiles taken from the 300 used to generate G-Code cutting paths


The scripts are then individually excuted, cutting slices from 1/8 inch high-density MDF particle board individually. As a final step, each slice is laminated together sequentially creating the finished piece. The entire process, from data aquisition, processing, prototyping and final cutting took about four months.

The three axis gantry CNC mill used to cut the slices. The bed measures around 15'x8' and moves in the XYZ directions. This machine is also a plasma cutter, and can profile sheet steel as well.



 The final sculpture



This piece is available for exhibition, and is currently for sale; $5000USD
 If you have any question or inquirys, please email for information.

For a closer view, please download High Resolution Photos

Additional documentation can be found here;:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/n4t3nate/sets/72157604915401258/

Along with a lecture I gave summer 2008, explaining the process and giving some insight into the notion of the modern human cyborg:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDiXiznF_aI
http://www.gnomedex.com/speaker-profile-nathan-wade/

Thanks,

Nathan Wade
DXArts University of Washington
Seattle, WA USA
n4t3@u.washington.edu