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Beautiful Drum Sequencer Design Has Balls
Posted by Gizmodo US Edition at 1:02 AM on January 15, 2008
Experimenting with how musicians physically interact with an electronic kit is not new but this design for a drum sequencer interface by doctoral student Peter Bennett is just awesome. It's simple too: each drum effect has a track on BeatBearing's plastic screen, and by dropping a ball bearing into a hole you activate that track's effect as a scanning light beam encounters it. When you watch a video of it in action, moving the bearings around in real time is like a kind of weird drum ballet:
BeatBearing currently only has 4 tracks, so highly complex sequences aren't really possible. But we do wonder what would happen, flying-ball-bearingly-speaking if you really turned the speed up.
Comments (AU Comments · US Comments)
There are currently no AU comments for this post.
Bash_
Posted 10:04 AM 14/1/08
that is a really nice looking gadget, should get mass produced sometime in the next few years if you ask me
Bash_
ericdfields
Posted 10:01 AM 14/1/08
I want this for my coffee table.
ericdfields
ideaman2020
Posted 9:54 AM 14/1/08
Colbert would be proud.
ideaman2020
mthrndr
Posted 9:35 AM 14/1/08
Can it make beats that don't sound like the backdrop of the movie 'Breakin'?
mthrndr
Munch
Posted 9:29 AM 14/1/08
Gimme
Munch
Shrike
Posted 9:22 AM 14/1/08
Now that is just fracken' cool. I'm sure you could get software that does exactly the same thing. But I love the pure analog/hand's on feel of it.
Shrike
ContemplativeTwig
Posted 11:22 AM 14/1/08
My god, with the right outputs, etc. this would hold the most holy of live DJ possibilities!!
I want
ContemplativeTwig
Murph1908
Posted 11:16 AM 14/1/08
That looks like hours of fun at a party.
Murph1908
perros
Posted 11:49 AM 14/1/08
The colours remind me of Rock Band.
-Perros-
perros
weggles90
Posted 3:24 PM 14/1/08
Reminds me of Lumines for some reason.
weggles90
smellevator
Posted 2:41 PM 14/1/08
Total ripoff (even if in slick plastic & metal) of:
[www.jeffhoefs.com]
Seen at:
[blog.makezine.com]
The older idea (dates at least back to March 2007) is cooler, and lets you do more interesting rhythms.
smellevator
ripfire4
Posted 1:45 PM 14/1/08
Umm. Couldn't you just do this on a computer?
ripfire4
dantax
Posted 3:53 PM 14/1/08
Can't believe nobody said this yet... Needs more cowbell!
And yes, you can do this on a computer, but that's missing the point. As an example, FL Studio is an easy to use program for sequencing and making drum loops, but what makes this cool is it's hands-on interface.
Not every artist is a geek. So designing a different way to do something is definitely cool.
dantax
ideaman2020
Posted 5:17 PM 14/1/08
Downside is there aren't enough holes to do triplets.
ideaman2020
josecardozo
Posted 10:03 AM 14/1/08
is this what ancient humans used instead of reactables?
josecardozo
rikkdbomb
Posted 4:00 PM 19/1/08
when or how could i ever have this beauty
rikkdbomb