5.31.2008

Tablo - conductive fabric gesture controller



Adrian Freed's "Tablo"

"As the conductive stretchable fabric... is displaced towards the bowl it shorts out different lengths of ...conductive plastic... The result is a circular array of nearly mass-less displacement sensors. The gesture-to-displacement relationship changes according to distance from the center of the bowl..." read more

5.23.2008

A Bicycle Built for Two



Daisy.mp3

Original "Daisy" Song 1961
Max Mathews, John Kelly, and Carol Lochbaum

From a Wikipedia article on Max Matthews: "In 1961, Mathews arranged the well-known song Daisy Bell ("Daisy, daisy") for an uncanny performance by computer-synthesized human voice, using technology developed by John Kelly of Bell Laboratories and others. Arthur C. Clarke of 2001: A Space Odyssey fame was coincidentally visiting friend and colleague John Pierce at the Bell Labs Murray Hill facility at the time of this remarkable speech synthesis demonstration and was so impressed that he used it in the climactic scene of his novel and screenplay for 2001: A Space Odyssey, where the HAL 9000 computer sings the same song as astronaut Dave Bowman disables his cognitive functions."

5.12.2008

Microfiche Music Machine



Here's more info about the band Microfiche

Awesome Maker Faire 2008 video

So far this is the best Maker Faire 2008 summary I've seen - it captures the diversity of projects and amazing stuff quite well. Note however that even this great vid represents barely 1/10 of the actual amazingness to be found at this huge Faire.

Oh, and look for a brief shot of The Stribe at about 7:34. :)



From: curiousinventor.com

5.11.2008

Cycling74 mentions Stribe, and Electronic Musician article

Cycling74 has a nice mention of the stribe and a pic re: Maker Faire 2008

Electronic Musician May 2008: DIY Resurgence by Scott Wilkinson

5.06.2008

The Stribe @ Maker Faire featured on hackaday.com



link to article

The Stribe booth at Maker Faire 2008



Some kids totally diggin' the way-out sounds



All hands on deck



Booth with stribe logo (made from construction paper)



I gave a brief presentation about the Stribe - unfortunately I was completely unprepared and I had sound driver issues - better luck next time, I hope



Me (left) and Vlad (right), showing off the latest Stribe prototype

more: Flickr

5.04.2008

Maker Faire San Mateo, Day 1

Yesterday was the debut of the Stribe at Maker Faire, and it was amazing! A non-stop procession of fascinated people surrounded the booth for 10 straight hours. Stribe pioneer Vlad Spears totally saved the day when my MOTU interface gave up the ghost 2 hours into the demo. Just when I thought all was lost, Vlad stepped into the breach, fired up his own machine and held the crowd mesmerized with his lovely new Max 5 app, "Scalar", which made the Stribe into a wonderfully easy-to-play instrument. He manned the booth heroically and provided detailed explanations of the stribe, the monome, Max, and how it all fits together. I don't think he drank, ate, or sat down the whole time. My own demos pretty much relied on the MOTU, so without Scalar and Vlad it's hard to say what the day would have been like.

Thank You Vlad! You are a true rockstar, in every sense of the word.

I'm still a bit stunned at the level of interest and the many wonderful conversations I had with visitors and fellow Makers.

Today I hope to borrow an audio/MIDI interface from a fellow Maker and run some of my original demos, including a cool demo app written by stretta, along with a couple of my own creations.

Thanks to everyone who stopped by the booth on Day 1. I apologize if I didn't get to chat or you caught me in a flustered moment, but the onslaught of Make fans was unrelenting (which is really great) and I was overwhelmed at times. It was cool to meet members of the Stribe community in person, and I came away feeling both grateful and proud and just plain tickled. Something tells me this is going to be quite a ride. Thanks SO much for the enthusiasm and encouragement so far - it really does keep me going.

I have some great pictures and I'll post them as soon as I can. :)

Now it's time to get ready for Maker Faire, Day 2!