| Pulse |
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Pulse is a work-in-progress interactive sound art piece created for the 2004 Design and Technology Show. The installation is made up of two main parts: a home-made instument built out of assorted Home Depot parts, and an interactive floor.
The instrument consists of 16 steel pipes of different lengths, with a tensed nylon string running through each of the pipes. 16 Servo motors rest beside the pipes, each motor striking a different pipe with a steel rod. 16 high-speed motors are placed beneath the pipes, striking the nylon strings that go through the pipes. The resultant sound is a mix of the precussive nature of the pipes with the hum of a string being struck dozens of times per second, resonating inside the steel pipes. The floor - a grid of 64 switches (8 x 8) hidden underneath vinyl tiles - activate the motors that strike the pipes. The grid is divided into 4 x 4 quadrants (16 quadrants in total): if one of the switches inside the quadrant is activated, the Servo Motor strikes the pipe; is more than one switch is activated, the high-speed motor is activated as well. The brains of the operation lie in two hand-built electronic circuits. The first circuit receives the state of the floor switches, parses this information through a PIC microcontroller, and sends the data to a nearby PC running MAX MSP. The second circuit receives the data from the PC and a second PIC microcontrorller activates the corresponding motors. The installation creates a collective instrument based on the walking patterns of the crowd. The more people, the richer the melodies created. The complete piece measures 8' x 8' in the floor, and 7' x 7' in the wall. |