Wayang Kulit is indeed one of the works that is quite close to Malaysian heritage culture. The term wayang, which means 'shadow', has been formed to translate various folk stories behind the white cloth screen for teaching the audience.
However, the storytelling role handled by Tok Dalang is not an easy thing to form in the new generation - understanding the trickle down, Ahnaf Hakimi, a graduate of Bachelor of Fine Arts and Master of Multimedia Instruction from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) came up with his idea of robotic technology to produce Wayang Kulit Animatronics (WKA) for public viewing.
This means through a fully robotic application – it does not require the physical presence of the Tok Dalang, the musical group, and the support team in the operation of the physical wayang kulit stage. Even puppet characters are also produced using 3D printing and everything is moved using an automatic control system.
For information, the Ahnaf group took a year and an allocation of around RM30,000 in costs to make this project a success before being ready to show it to the public, and they admitted that at the beginning of the project development there were technical issues that arose but these issues were successfully resolved from time to time.
So through this robotic wayang kulit approach, the writer sees that it not only limits the group's energy in making this work a success but also wants to encourage the new generation and tourists to be able to understand and enjoy Malaysia's heritage more easily, with the support of technology.
For those of you who want to witness the uniqueness of this Animatronic Skin Puppet performance, don't miss the opportunity to watch it at DagByFilamen Kedai KL, Mahsa Avenue until September 4, every day from 10am to 6pm.