For his Automaton music video, the Jamiroquai frontman suits up with illuminated 3D printed headgear crafted by London-based designer Moritz Waldemeyer.

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Grooving around since global success with Virtual Insanity in 1996, it’s probably safe to say Jamiroquai has cemented its place in the annals of pop-culture history. Especially so for that particular song’s Jonathan Glazer-directed music video.

Fresh for 2017, the band has released Automaton, a single from their new album, also named Automaton. In it, frontman Jay Kay features as a despondent… well, automaton, roaming an empty post-apocalyptic wasteland.

Besides the singer busting out his best robot moves (sorry), the most striking thing in the video is the headgear. A 3D printed helmet steals the show, with its pulsating light show mesmerizing over an array of electronically actuated scales.

German-born, London-based designer Moritz Waldemeyer created the Automaton helmet.

It’s quite likely you’ve seen Waldemeyer’s handiwork before. He has previously designed wearable pieces such as a laser suit for Bono on U2’s 360 tour, and LED jackets for the members of band OK GO.

Making The Jamiroquai Automaton Helmet

Waldemeyer and his team collaborated with Jay Kay to design the helmet. In part inspired by nature, the helm also draws upon futuristic concepts for its look.

Waldemeyer explains:

“The starting point for inspiration that Jay Kay gave us was the pangolin. Not only did it capture his imagination as an endangered species, also the scale patterns offered a great starting point aesthetically.”

To begin, Waldemeyer and his team took 3D head scans of Jay Kay to build a parametric model. This model features numerous variable parameters such as the number of scales, and their length and appearance.

Speaking to ALL3DP, Waldemeyer said ” This allowed us to have direct design feedback from Jay Kay, just with a laptop we could morph the design in real time until the shape was perfect.”

“Once the model was perfect we exported every component for 3D printing on our Ultimaker 2. Post printing and assembly was incredibly laborious to get the finish we required.”

The LED arrays on the helmet make use of a proprietary playback device Waldemeyer developed for his wearable lighting based projects.

“It allows us to stream video data to addressable LEDs from an SD card. We can send motion data to servo motors at the same time –- in our system the servo motors receive the same protocol as the LEDs, we can mix and match LEDs and servo motors at our heart’s content on the same communication line. This approach keeps the wiring just within sanity levels, it still takes up many hours during the assembly.”

Giving Jay Kay direct control over its movement, the helmet literally becomes an extension of his impressive dancing repertoire.

Source: Dezeen