If you’ve ever realised how much potential a box of dry pasta has as a shakeable instrument, you’ll immediately understand why Lorenzo Bravi’s Hit the Beat drum machine is so wonderful. Because, whatever you have on hand, from dry beans to bottle camps, suddenly becomes a real-life drum sample.
You don’t need to be a musician or have any kind of musical timing to be able to play it either. The machine, which is connected to a series of wooden platforms hiding actuators inside, vibrates whatever you place on top — be it a coffee mug or a pile of skittles.
An Arduino takes care of all the processing and triggering, and the system uses MIDI to turn the beats from a drum machine iPad app into the real-life sounds. With standard drum machine software, you’re stuck with a library of pre-recorded samples or samples you capture yourself. But with Lorenzo’s creation, those samples can instantly be anything you get your hands on. [Hit the Beat via Creative Applications Network]