Pcomp - Weeks 10 - 14 Final Project

I started working on an idea that I've had for a while now - creating an experimental musical instrument - a deconstructed version of the arabic Oud (though inspired also by Sitar and saz).

While western music mostly uses tones and half tones, instrument like the Oud are used to produce quarter tones as well. When playing the Oud the left hand usually slide on the fretless neck to produce this sounds hence is responsible for the "analog" aspect of moving through a range of microtones, while the right hand for most parts plays the "digital" part - meaning either strumming a string or not strumming it. My attempt in this project is to explore how switching the digital and analog aspect behind the Oud will affect the playing. I am planning to test it by replacing the fretless neck with digital buttons and the string picking with a potentiometer that transpose the pitch of the scale.

The idea came originally from this sketch:

And later evolved to these:

I decided to make it the size of a ukulele for project scope reasons as well as personal preference. Since I don't have any fabrications skill I'm planning to hack it with a danish cookie tin connected to a rectangular piece of wood. I heard that on the shop downstair it's possible to fabricate wood using 3D models. if that's the case I will achieve the final goal i made for this instrument in a 3d design visualisation I made.

I measured my banjo ukulele size and recreated it in maya with a few ornaments to make it look futuristic with motherboard motifs:

Then I added textures with Gemini:

I just realized it looks like the sword of the green power ranger and felt an urge to change it.

The noise was still to much so I changed it again:

I liked this one much better but it didn't feel tight, an I was also told the silver part of the neck looks like it can be interactive so I made this final version I'm pretty happy with:

I feel like it's hinting to to conceptual origin of the instrument but also have a gentle futuristic vibe.

I started setting up the breadboard to create a basic version of the instrument. I will probably start with a potentiometer to control the transposition of the scale but will also test the proximity sensor and might replace it in the future.

The code is built so the user will be able to produce a "pull off" effect like the one that exists in Oud and other string instruments. so when one button is released and another one is still pressed it will play continuously without the need of an additional press. I added some vibrato and delay to give it more character, and maybe because surf music and echo has a cultural association with middle eastern music.

This is how it sounds like:

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/4f4da0_d72e5b91fa3c46d9bf94730cd06d26d5/480p/mp4/file.mp4

After testing it I'm thinking about adding some additional buttons to help the user create some basic riffs, since one tone divided to 4 microtones may be too limiting for a player. on the other hand also 3 notes are limiting o maybe I should embrace this limitation.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Next step was creating the mockup. I created it more or less in the size of my banjolele, only using tape so i can easily work with many wires and place the buttons on the neck.

Then I soldered the wires (later I found out that it was done very badly) to the buttons securing them with a board they were pinned into:

I later realized that was a bit messy and braided the wires. I checked pull off and hammer on effects on the button worked properly on each pair of buttons. The potentiometer set up for 2 octaves was distorting the sound really badly though and I thought it was a side affect of using the tone library. I later found out that the bad wiring might have been the cause for that.

I made a small hole for the cable and left the back side opened for easy access to the breadboard and the electric components.

I glued everything up so it would be sturdy and brought this to the play test and thought everything is going fine.

But during the play test all of the features stopped working, the sound was muffled and distorted and some button were playing continuously after pressing them once.

The problem was me leaving many exposed wires that interfered with the circuit proper behavior. Lesson was learned. I had to slice the hot glue to open the instrument and re-solder everything.

Then my potentiometer died leaving a trail of smoke behind it.

I soldered another one but then everything stopped working. I was trying to isolate the problem with a multimeter and all of the wiring had current running in them. I then checked the voltage of the pin that the speaker was connected to and it seemed dead. I defined a different pin and it worked. I suspect the short circuit that burned the potentiometer burned this pin input as well. And i think it might have happend because I used a 68 ohm resistor to generate stronger sound but it made a short circuit .

---------------------------------------------------------------

Now it's playing and here is my proof:

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/4f4da0_ca86702e54be43b0b9b0805ceaad193a/1080p/mp4/file.mp4

I hope the instrument stays in tact until presentation, but now it is supposed to be wired corectly.

In the future I hope to create a more refined wooden or acrylic version of it and to test it with daisy seed to achieve a smoother deeper sound. I would also try to test it with 6 more buttons and a distance sensor.