Wireless piano
September 21, 2015 12:31 PM Subscribe
Experiments with MakeyMakey have led me to dive deep into the Maker World. I'm trying to develop a completely wireless version of a project I developed and I'm not sure if I'm going in the right direction.
My project is a much simpler, lo-fi version of the Reactable. I have several small objects (about the size & shape of a pencil) that are wired to a MakeyMakey. When placed on a grounded metallic board (also connected to the MakeyMakey), each object creates a different musical note. I'm trying to find a way to remove the wires in this project, but I'm not sure if this is possible. I've used the Bluefruit EZ-key from Adafruit, but that really only eliminates the need for a physical wire between between my computer and the circuit board: the objects themselves are still wired. I've considered using NFC technology, (giving each object it's own NFC chip and wiring a reader to the main board) but this will not work for various reasons, mostly related to latency and precision.
Basically, I want different objects to touch one main board and to create different results, based on which object is touching the board, but I don't want to have to wire each object to a circuit board. I've done a little bit of research on Max/MSP and I think this may be the right direction to go, but I've never used the program and I'm not entirely sure of its capabilities. Is it possible to program MAX/MSP to recognize each object separately and play a different note. (For example: maybe I could wrap each object in types of metal with different levels of resistance and program MAX/MSP to play a different note based on registering the conductivity levels of each object. Not sure if that's a feasible example, but it's just for example's sake).
I apologize if this seems confusing, feel free to ask if you need additional information.
My project is a much simpler, lo-fi version of the Reactable. I have several small objects (about the size & shape of a pencil) that are wired to a MakeyMakey. When placed on a grounded metallic board (also connected to the MakeyMakey), each object creates a different musical note. I'm trying to find a way to remove the wires in this project, but I'm not sure if this is possible. I've used the Bluefruit EZ-key from Adafruit, but that really only eliminates the need for a physical wire between between my computer and the circuit board: the objects themselves are still wired. I've considered using NFC technology, (giving each object it's own NFC chip and wiring a reader to the main board) but this will not work for various reasons, mostly related to latency and precision.
Basically, I want different objects to touch one main board and to create different results, based on which object is touching the board, but I don't want to have to wire each object to a circuit board. I've done a little bit of research on Max/MSP and I think this may be the right direction to go, but I've never used the program and I'm not entirely sure of its capabilities. Is it possible to program MAX/MSP to recognize each object separately and play a different note. (For example: maybe I could wrap each object in types of metal with different levels of resistance and program MAX/MSP to play a different note based on registering the conductivity levels of each object. Not sure if that's a feasible example, but it's just for example's sake).
I apologize if this seems confusing, feel free to ask if you need additional information.
The way to do this is to use RFID or some other contactless sensing.
There are a bunch of different kits for Arduino, but for the most part what you're going to do is take the main reader and wind your own coil on the bottom of the table around the perimeter. You'll likely have to be careful about matching the coil specs of the original (wire thickness, number of turns, length).
Then you embed RFID tags inside your objects and you should be able to work with it.
Some readers may not be able to handle multiple tags simultaneously, so if that's important, check the reader specs.
posted by plinth at 6:14 AM on September 22, 2015
There are a bunch of different kits for Arduino, but for the most part what you're going to do is take the main reader and wind your own coil on the bottom of the table around the perimeter. You'll likely have to be careful about matching the coil specs of the original (wire thickness, number of turns, length).
Then you embed RFID tags inside your objects and you should be able to work with it.
Some readers may not be able to handle multiple tags simultaneously, so if that's important, check the reader specs.
posted by plinth at 6:14 AM on September 22, 2015
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posted by moonmilk at 12:49 PM on September 21, 2015