We think this is an intriguing take on half-tone art. It’s a CNC machine that uses an Arduino and two stepper motors to draw on a paper-covered drum. But you’re not just going to set it and forget it. To simplify the device, the Z-axis is not mechanized, but requires the dexterous opposing digit of a person to actuate.

The first prototype used a frame cut from plywood, but the developers moved to some attractive laser-cut Lexan for the final version. The rotating drum was inspired by observing the off-set printing process. It greatly simplifies the build when compared to a flat CNC bed. But including a Z-axis solution that could account for differently sized dots really opens a can of worms. Because of this, the choice was made not to automate that task, but to leave it up to the user. A clickable Sharpie does the marking. When the pen is in place, you click the plunger to hold the felt tip against the paper until a dot of the appropriate size has leeched onto the paper.

It’s not a bad solution to the problem. Especially if you don’t have the high-end milling equipment necessary to do this on a piece of plywood.

[Thanks Dron]

Sometimes projects are vast, complicated, and complex. Other times projects are a bit more on the simple. Today we thought we would share a couple projects with something in common that may be familiar sounding to the more experienced crowd, but may inspire a few readers new to the world of microcontrollers.

First off, a cool decor tip looking to snazz up a college residence or bar is a guide for lighting up a shelf of liquor bottles using an Arduino to control a few RGB LEDs. This guide includes easy to follow schematics, source code, and a good explanation of using transistors to drive higher current to the LEDs than the Arduino could provide.

This six finger drum machine uses a Drum Kit – Kit AI to take in values from piezo sensors and convert those values into MIDI information to be used by either a hardware MIDI controller or PC. We like the CNC cut hand, and the design considerations put into it (like vibration buffering)

When moving beyond the buttons and LEDs in every starter kit out there, PIR motion sensors are usually a good next step. [LemonSlice] even goes so far as to add a a pair of XBees for making this motion sensor a little more autonomous.

[Wilfred's] brother outfitted a snare drum with LEDs for Dutch Carnival. They faded through different colors randomly and were a nice addition to the normal looking instrument, but [Wilfred] suggested that the LEDs change color with each drum stroke. He set out to design a controller circuit to provide the functionality and ended with a small package based around an ATtiny2313 microcontroller. A piezo buzzer is used to detect the vibrations inside the drum, each hit triggering a different color combination. The LEDs fade to off after each impact as if dying along with the sound, and when not struck for 30 seconds the system defaults to a red heartbeat pattern. See for yourself after the break.

We’d love to see this feature added to each drum in one of those robotic drumsets.

This robotic band has just the right amount of drums. [Liat] and her colleagues fit a group of Darbuka drums with a pair of servo-driven mallets. We’re quite surprised that the servo motors achieve such a successful strike and rebound without dampening the vibrations of the drum head. This is more often accomplished with solenoids because of their quick response and relative strength.

You can listen to a performance of this work-in-progress in the video after the break or make plans to see it live. The installment was built for the Bat-Yam international biennale of landscape urbanism. It will be attached to, and powered by alternative energy producers like solar cells and wind turbines.

This sequencer, called Drumssette, uses audio tape to churn out some beats. [Mike Walters] built this around a Tascam four track cassette recorder. The tape inside has a different drum sound on each of the tracks, with a corresponding row of red buttons. Pushing a button adds the drum sound to the loop on that beat. He’s using a series of digital logic gates to patch through the sounds as well as clocking the device from one of the tape’s tracks. It’s pretty  neat  to see the focus selector used in the video after the break to sync up the beginning of the repeated drum patterns. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen [Mike's] work. If you missed it last year take some time to review the Melloman.

Hardware  walk through

Audio demonstration

The silent drum is played with your hands. It acts as a midi device by analyzing the movement of the rubbery black drum head. As you can see in the photo, one side of the body is clear and the other is white. A light shines up into it to boost the contrast and a camera picks up the black head as it moves past the white side of the shell. [Jaime Oliver] has provided an interesting look at the analysis method used with this instrument and there’s also a system of notating a composition for future performance. See and hear it played in the demo after the break.

[Thanks Elijah]

Move over Steve and PEART… there’s yet another robotic drummer in town. [Fauzii] tipped us off to his own MIDI-controlled creation – WizardFingers. According to him, WizardFingers is already capable of 64th note rolls at over 250 beats per minute. That’s on every drum simultaneously. Each drum is hit with a lever attached to a linear pneumatic actuator. A laptop running MAX/MSP generates MIDI sequences, which are sent to Doepfer MTC64 board. All of these actuators are hooked up to the board, which sets them off in sequence.

[Fauzii] ultimately hopes to develop AI software that will allow WizardFingers to compose its own tunes on not only a drum kit, but bar chimes and an organ as well. His site documents the whole concept quite well (just watch out for wild cats).

Mix a cup of mechanical engineering with a dash of drum set and you end up with Steve, the robotic drummer. We know that it uses an MSA-T Midi Decoder but that’s about the extent of what has been shared. Just from observing the video, we think Steve’s got a few things going for him when compared to PEART, the robot drummer we saw back in 2005. Steve features two sticks for each drum and symbol and seems to be quite responsive.

Steve’s great, but we still think Rick Allen’s got this thing beat. Although this is a quality build, there’s no replacement for a human that can bang the drum in millions of subtly different way. That isn’t to say we don’t see potential in the hack. Perhaps it’s time to update a classic idea, the robotic orchestra.  Don’t know what we mean? Check out  3:58 into the video embedded after the break.

Take a look at the robotic orchestra 3:58 into the video.

[via Highly Liquid]

We’ve covered sequencers before, but reader [Johan] sent in his latest project that is much more minimalistic approach. Dubbed the BBox, he based his drum generator on an Arduino and an LCD display. Rather than synthesizing sound, the Arduino just outputs MIDI which is then interpreted by his Roland Juno-D. In building the device he used a favorite trick of ours to keep the interface clean. He then found an awesome banana box to use as a case. Although, the project may not be as functional as some of the others out there, it certainly has flair. Video of it in action after the break.

We’ve seen some impressive mods for the popular video game Rock Band, from new cymbals to an air powered kick pedal, but we cant say we’ve seen someone go as far as the folks over at EDrums. They start off making their own mesh heads, a junction box to connect everything, and then a base to hold it all together. It is definitely some dedication and hard work for a setup that will only be used in the living room in front of the T.V. Check out some more video of it in action, and a comparison to the original Rock Band drum set, after the break.

A team of three PhD students constructed this ‘multi-mallet automatic drumming instrument (Madi)‘. Their Expressive Machines Musical Instruments site is dedicated to building instruments like this and they recently showed their work at the first annual Guthman Musical Instrument Competition. A ‘low-stakes X Prize’ for musical instruments. 25 applicants were chosen to show their unique musical instruments for $10K in prizes. We like the team’s Madi because it’s adapting a traditional instrument and then pushing it to the limit. It reminds us of the Crazy J mechatronic guitar from 2005. You can see a video of the Madi playing below.

[via Hacked Gadgets]

[Raphael] sent us this nice kick pedal mod for Guitar Hero: World Tour. After breaking his kick pedal repeatedly, he decided to build something a bit more robust. He went to the music store intending to pick up a cheap kick pedal to start with and happened to start a conversation with an employee who had a practice pad to get rid of. [Raphael] relieved him of his practice pad and promptly made a base to hold it in position. After attaching his piezo sensor to the back of it, he had a very robust kick pedal. we can’t imagine him breaking this one any time soon.

Embedded above is [egyokeo]‘s solution for using MIDI drums with Guitar Hero. He’s playing a DrumKAT MIDI kit. It connects to a PC running his MIDI Hero software, which handles timing and multinote combinations. The PC uses a USB ToolStick microcontroller to send commands to the console using an FPS adapter or soldered into the instrument. It’s a fairly good solution if you’re building a generic controller and need to modify the signaling.

When Rock Band was first released, modders sought to adapt their MIDI drum kits for use with the game. The easiest solution they found was Highly Liquid’s MSA-P. It’s a photorelay based MIDI decoder. You need to solder directly to the brain in the Rock Band drums. If you’re planning on modding any instrument, check the compatibility matrix first. Hopefully you’ll end up with something that can be used across multiple games.

[via Gizmodo]