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Biography

“My full name is Christopher Maraffi, but I go by Topher. I’m a performance artist, technical animator, educator, and author. For many years I lectured on the topic of 3D character creation and have written three popular books on the subject that are on Disney's suggested reading list. I’m also a social dance instructor, and one of the principal developers and promoters of the Swango fusion partner dance style. .............. .............. In June 2010 I completed a Digital Arts & New Media (DANM) MFA at UCSC. My thesis was Mimesis & Mocap, a multi-disciplinary (Theater Arts and Computer Science) performance study in creating believable real-time acting between live and virtual performers within a theatrical show. My two performances, The Avatar Dance and The Magic Mirror Game, envision methods of re-creating classic dance and pantomime movements with a digital double, or avatar. .............. .............. In the fall 2010 I will start a PhD in Computer Science at UCSC, continuing my collaboration with Theater Arts, to develop expressive and improvisational real-time synthespians. I will be a member of Arnav Jalah's Computational Cinematics group, which is part of the Expressive Intelligence Studio (EIS), that is run by Michael Mateas and Noah Wardrip-Fruin. .............. .............. My artistic intent is to fuse theatrical, cinematic, and gaming techniques (such as live dance-acting, digital puppetry, performance capture, and expressive processing) into a new medium of performative entertainment, which I call The Theatre of the Avatar. .............. .............. See my performances in my videos tab, or go to my web site: www.chrismaraffi.com”