Beam Beats tangible rhythm sequencer: work is in progress!

Beam Beats is an interactive and tangible rhythm sequencer that translates the geometry of beacons on the ground into rhythms and polyrhythms thanks to a rotating laser beam. This experimental MIDI instrument is about investigating self-similarities in polyrhythms, as described in this post.

Update: Here’s the video of a demo at Dorkbot at La Gaité Lyrique in Paris

BeamBeats demo at Dorkbot at la Gaité Lyrique from cyrille martraire on Vimeo.

Before I report more on this project with demos and videos, here are some pictures to illustrate the work currently in progress, thanks to lasercutting techniques in particular:

The brand new laser-cut acrylic structure

The prototype laser head and retro-reflection light sensor

photo3 (2) — The Arduino to detect the light variations and convert them into MIDI notes

Very early design of beacons each with their own light sensor

This prototype works, here’s a picture of the laser beam rotating:

The revolving laser beam reflected on the wall

And here’s a very short early video (no sound)

Beam Beats – revolving laser beam to detect beacons from cyrille martraire on Vimeo.

I’ve been working on the Arduino source code to add the ability to send MIDI clock in order to sync Beam Beats to other MIDI devices.

Now I mostly need to conclude on the design for the active beacons(sensors stands) and the passive (retroreflective adhesive stands) beacons, and find out what to play with this sequencer…

Every post on this project: http://cyrille.martraire.com/tag/beam-beats