[Noisebridge-discuss] This Weekend Instrument-Making Workshops

[T.bias™]

I'd first take the synth "out of the loop" by just using a soft synth (only
need a laptop, DAW, and MIDI interface; if you don't I'm sure someone else
does, but seeing as you mentioned Ableton Live, it sounds like you are
already there) to focus on your hardware and conversion to MIDI. Actually,
I'd also negate the MIDI conversion as well, depending on how you are doing
things…

I bet you can get old drum MIDI triggers on Ebay rather cheap, but getting
pitch awareness in there is just a bit harder. (I.e., It's *really* easy to
take a gated sound and convert it into an "on/off" MIDI note that is
preselected; hell, just buy an old DM4 that Alesis used to make and you are
there.)

Or…Just get a plugin for your DAW that does pitch to MIDI. I think Pluggo
has that in there and many DAWs come with something like that in the
utilities department right out of the box.

I get the feeling that you want to end up with a standalone instrument, but
I figure you can use the ease of plugins to let you focus on one thing at a
time; I suspect the hardest will be your hardware, not so much the
conversion to MIDI nor taking that MIDI and plugging it into the device of
your choice. ;-)



Sadly, what *I* want to make is mostly an aesthetic hack that costs money
as I need a full wireless mic set up that is very robust, performance
"proof", and doesn't neglect audio quality; sadly, good wireless mic setups
ain't cheap. (Hell, my IEM [In Ear Monitor] receiver rig was $1,200–not
counting the $800 molded ear buds…OUCH–and I'm not even sure it will still
work in the current frequency onslaught.) So I doubt I'll be heading out
for circuit bending or analog instrument banging…
--
T.bias™


Eclectic media production.
www.TobiasTenney.com


On Thu, Jan 10, 2013 at 8:11 PM, Tony Arcieri <tony.arcieri at gmail.com>wrote:

> This sounds awesome! I've had an idea for an instrument I have some of the
> parts for but have never completed.
>
> I have some sensors (a linear position sensor and a square pressure
> sensor), which I've been wanting to use to control a monosynth. The basic
> idea is the linear position sensor can control pitch and the pressure
> sensor can control velocity, with the intended result being a synthesizer
> that can be played akin to a one-string slap bass. I'd probably mount
> everything to a 1x4 or something and put a guitar strap on it.
>
> I originally planned on trying to control a simple monosynth (Gakken
> SX-150) and was hacking on that for awhile with the assistance of an EE
> friend in another state who was looking at the schematics. I never got that
> working properly and gave up and have since lost the Gakken while moving :(
> We both learned empirically that the gate of a monosynth is on/off, in my
> case by desoldering a surface mount resistor. We talked about using a
> MOSFET or something to control the velocity but I never got around to
> buying the parts.
>
> I have an unassembled Arduino MIDI shield, but no Arduino. I'd love to get
> some MIDI output from the sensors (preferably with some pots to adjust the
> sensitivity) so I can run them into software like Reason. So I guess my
> questions are:
>
> 1) Does anyone have an Arduino I can borrow, or potentially buy? Or
> perhaps any other solutions for going from sensors -> MIDI
> 2) Is anyone who wants to go to the circuit-bending class, or perhaps one
> of the people teaching it, familiar with Arduino MIDI enough to perhaps
> help me out generating the sort of MIDI output I'd need to use these
> sensors as an instrument
> 3) Does anyone have an old monosynth they'd like to try to put this sort
> of sensor interface on to? I think it'd be neat to go the all analog route
> too, even if the next step was Ableton Live ;)
> 4) Has anyone built an instrument like this before and if so, how much do
> they suck?
>
>
> On Thu, Jan 10, 2013 at 7:11 PM, johny radio <johnyradio at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>  Hi List!
>>
>> More details on this weekend's free *INSTRUMENT**-MAKING WORKSHOPS**. *No
>> experience necessary.
>>
>> *Date: THIS SATURDAY AND SUNDAY**, Jan 12 & 13**, 10:30 am to 9 **pm,
>> both days. *Breaking for lunch and dinner.
>>
>> PLEASE SIGNUP BY EMAILING ME! johnyradio at gmail.com
>>
>> *NON-ELECTRONIC**
>> *The excellent Jim Stockford will be your guide, with backup from johny
>> radio and the humble problem-solver-MacGyver, Lx. You must bring a rough
>> idea, and materials that you want to transform into your instrument (wood,
>> rubber, catgut, etc etc). Think bowed, struck, plucked, blown, hummed-into,
>> shaken, stirred, etc.
>>
>> *CIRCUIT-BENDING**
>> *This means opening up the guts of an a noise-making toy, and blindly
>> altering the wiring to get wacky results :) The eclectic and handsome
>> Martin gmod4life1 Deviddo will be your guide, with backup from Lx and Johny
>> Radio. You must bring a somewhat functional noise-making toy or electronic
>> instrument that you want to bend.
>>
>> If you can help by being a Guide, please email me at johnyradio at
>> gmail.com. Especially need non-electronic guides.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Noisebridge-discuss mailing list
>> Noisebridge-discuss at lists.noisebridge.net
>> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/noisebridge-discuss
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Tony Arcieri
>
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>
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