Man Uses a 3-D Model of Himself to Take Hilarious Selfies

• AUTHOR: JENNA GARRETT.JENNA GARRETT

Chris Buck takes selfies … sort of. The photographer made a 3-D printed doppelgänger of himself, and has been wandering around the East and West Coast snapping pics of his mini-me’s adventures. The series, published only on Instagram, is a playful look at narcissism, social media and the irresistibility of tiny things.

The photographer had no idea what he’d do with a 3-D printed replica when he encountered a Doob shop in New York, but he couldn’t resist getting one. Buck was led into a white paneled booth and photographed simultaneously from every angle to create a 3-D photo, which was used to make the final model. The ten-inch figurine arrived in the mail a few weeks later, and Buck just had to take a picture with his phone. That’s when it hit him.

“I took it out of the box, put it on my desk and without even thinking took an iPhone photo. A new project was born,” he says. “The figurine is so real looking—the shape of my face, the stance of my body—and the way that a photograph compresses space moves it into a whimsical and magical place immediately.”

The series is appropriately titled Likeness—a partial wink toward “likes” on social media—and is rolling out daily on his Instagram with the hashtag #bucklikeness. The feed is a humorous narrative of a little man out on the town having madcap adventures—posing with a pig, napping on fig bars, contemplating what appears to be the world’s largest urinal. Buck uses proportions and scale to his advantage, and has photographed everywhere you could image. The dentist’s office, a child’s birthday party, garbage cans, even a strip club. Anywhere Buck goes, 3-D Buck goes too.

The photographer works on the fly, so shoots often are spontaneous. Sometimes it’s because he’s in a hurry; sometimes it’s because he’s shooting somewhere he shouldn’t. Moving fast also helps avoid drawing a crowd, because onlookers definitely have a tendency to gawk.

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Getting the perfect angle at Terminal C.  MICHELLE WATT

“The 3-D printing of something so alive and organic as a person is so new that people really flip out when they see me out with it,” he says. “I’ll be in a restaurant shooting with him on the table and people will come over and just marvel. Most of the time they’ve never even heard of this technology.”

Buck says he’s shot around 75 images that he’ll finish releasing in the next month, with a photo book to follow. Likeness is self-aware in its silliness and is an acute nod toward the orchestrated narcissism on social media. In a world of feet-photos and selfie sticks, a grown man carrying around a miniature version of himself doesn’t feel terribly unusual. Social media is a form of branding, a way to get your face out there—in Buck’s case, quite literally. As a professional photographer, Buck has reservations about using Instagram, but found a way to be genuine and do something a little out of the ordinary.

“The fact is that it’s a space where my clients and I can easily connect on a daily basis so I’m compelled to be there,” he says. “And while I’m there I might as well have fun.”

http://www.wired.com/2015/06/man-uses-3-d-model-take-hilarious-selfies/