# Machine and Wave

Canonical URL: https://baoyangchen.com/works/machine-and-wave/
Interactive page: https://baoyangchen.com/#work/machine-and-wave
Year: 2026
Category: AI Agent-based Works
Medium: Multi-arm mechanical core, projection, stroboscopic light, sound, visitor sensing

## Proposition
A fabricated body holds a field of possible motion until the viewer's attention makes that possibility collapse.

## Description
Machine and Wave begins with a mechanical body surrounded by projected movement. The machine is visible, but it is not yet fixed as hardware. A field of unrealized actions hovers around it.

The visitor's presence changes the room. Distance, duration, and body orientation accumulate as measured attention. As that attention rises, the projected field contracts, the arms lose range, the sound thins, and motion breaks into stroboscopic samples.

At a threshold, the room stops together. Projection drops out, the arms lock, and the mechanical core becomes clearer as machinery. The clarity arrives as loss.

## Viewer Entry
The viewer enters a room shared with a made body and its wave of possible actions. Looking and waiting feel ordinary at first. Gradually, the viewer senses that their attention is being counted. The machine becomes easier to see at the same moment its possible life begins to recede.

## Apparatus
The installation joins a multi-arm mechanical core, a projected field of unrealized motion, sound, stroboscopic light, and a sensing layer. The sensing layer reads distance, duration, and body orientation as an attention score. That score changes the room state: projected traces narrow, mechanical range contracts, sound thins, and the system reaches a shared stop. A final residue marks the visitor's part without turning the work into a data display.

## Sections
### Fabricated Life
The work begins from the old problem of the artificial performer: a made body that appears alive until its mechanism becomes too clear. Machine and Wave rebuilds this scene with projection, sensing, and mechanical exposure.

### The Wave
The projected field carries possible motions around the machine. These traces suggest actions the body might take before one state hardens.

### Measured Attention
The visitor is read through proximity, duration, and orientation. Attention is not a command, but it becomes a pressure on the field.

### Collapse
As attention accumulates, possible motion contracts. Sound pulls back, strobe samples the body, projection disappears, and the arms lock.

### Residue
After collapse, a faint trace remains. It is enough for the visitor to understand that the stop was not simple timing. Their presence entered the event.

## Images
1. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/hero-no-barrier-dark-front.png - The mechanical core sits inside a projected field of possible motion, holding body and wave in the same view.
2. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-paper-visuals-v2/03_measured-attention-high-view.png - As measured attention rises, the projected field gathers toward the mechanical body.
3. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-paper-visuals-v2/04_collapse-machine-as-object.png - Projection cuts out, the arms lock, and the machine becomes clearer as hardware.
4. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/04_from-014_ig_06525968018c83bc016a230b11d0648193b3ab5cdf5d0d8c84.png
5. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-paper-visuals-v2/01_outside-apparatus-unresolved-field.png - Projected traces extend beyond the machine, keeping unrealized actions visible before collapse.
6. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-paper-visuals-v2/05_residue-material-trace-detail.png - A faint trace of distance or duration remains after the stop, marking the visitor's part in the event.
7. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-paper-visuals-v2/02_low-floor-strobe-reflection.png
8. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/01_from-007_ig_06525968018c83bc016a2308f024748193835f52f4320e8e1b.png
9. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/02_from-009_ig_06525968018c83bc016a23095e04748193adbfb434067c5bc4.png
10. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/03_from-011_ig_06525968018c83bc016a230a4f9f5c8193943b3f5b9751dd74.png
11. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/05_from-018_ig_06525968018c83bc016a230b8dd7b48193b2e963606e70cd23.png
12. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/06_from-022_ig_06525968018c83bc016a230c3a8b44819399bd45be2ff13e9c.png
13. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/07_from-024_ig_06525968018c83bc016a230c9da62c819397985e7062e62cfc.png
14. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/08_from-027_ig_06525968018c83bc016a230d050c108193800ac7accddfce79.png
15. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/09_from-029_ig_06525968018c83bc016a230d9b3aec8193a7e68f04602f9b0a.png
16. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/effect-renders-jiyubo-clean/10_from-032_ig_06525968018c83bc016a230e3427a881938cd8272bf3d0bcd1.png
17. https://baoyangchen.com/original-site-media/machine-and-wave/RP.jpg

## Videos
1. https://player.vimeo.com/video/1203314161?h=d49c6c3986&badge=0&autopause=0&player_id=0&app_id=58479

## Source Pages
- https://vimeo.com/1203314161/d49c6c3986