Vince Nardy wanted to see what he would look like as a black man.

"Black seems like the total opposite of the spectrum," the fair-skinned Nardy (sophomore-division of undergraduate studies) said.

With the flash of a light bulb and a few clicks of a button, The Human Race Machine transformed Nardy's naturally Italian/Irish features into the image of a black man.

His hazel eyes darkened into a deep brown shade. Coffee-brown hair grazed his dark forehead. A tanned nose spread slightly across the center of his shadowed face.

Nardy was black.

His image also transformed into Asian, Hispanic, Indian and Middle Eastern descent within seconds.

As part of this year's Martin Luther King, Jr. Day activities, The Human Race Machine will be available to students in the HUB-Robeson Center until Friday from noon to 7 p.m. every day.

"The purpose of the machine is to see what you'd look like if you had been a different race," Race Relations Project facilitator Jason Weingarten (senior-human development and family studies) said.

Students wanting to experience the machine's effects stepped through a black curtain and stood in front of a screen, matching their eyes with two green circles on the screen's pattern.

The student's image is captured, and his or her picture appears, combined with general characteristics of the chosen race.

"[The machine] measures a composite of your particular face by picking out points -- eyes, nose, mouth and chin -- and distorts your face in a way that's common to those people in a particular racial group," Sam Richards, Race Relations Project co-director, said.

Such alterations include skin color, face width, eye color, eye shape, hairline, nose shape and eyebrows.

"I look like a stud," Nardy said jokingly when his African-American image was projected onto a large screen adjacent to the machine.

The Human Race Machine provided a relaxed atmosphere for students to reflect about race, Race Relations Project program coordinator Bryson Nobles said.

"Race is too serious of a topic to be taken so seriously," he said. "Hopefully this machine can make it something interesting and fun."

In addition to provoking laughs among friends, organizers hope the machine can benefit students by allowing them to see racial differences in a new light.

"People can see how easily it is to look like someone of a different race," Richards said, "We're not that different."

Scott Wolfman, president of Wolfman Productions, the distributor of the Human Race Machine, said it is one of five that have been used by 25 to 30 colleges across the nation.

"The feedback has been quite good," he said.

At noon yesterday, about a dozen students formed a line to experience the machine, many with differing opinions.

"It was interesting to see what you would look like if you were born somewhere else," Sarah Kraemer (junior-journalism) said.

Some students questioned the machine's ability to project accurate images.

"I don't know how much it seemed to change your face. It seemed like one face superimposed over your own," Claire Yeargers (junior-communication sciences and disorders) said.

Richards said the machine uses the universal features of each race to determine the student's image.

Wolfman said his hopes the Human Race Machine goes beyond its obvious appeal.

"It's not purely entertaining. Maybe in the five to 10 minutes a student spends with the machine, maybe some seeds were planted, however subtle," he said. "We are a lot more alike than different."