University Audio Science Project Suggestions!

[T1bbles]

Hey guys,

Today in uni we were set the task of coming up with an idea for our end of year audio science project in which we have to create something electrical and audio related. So, has anyone else here done a uni project before or does anyone have any suggestions on what I could do?

I was thinking maybe a theremin? But it's not the most original idea.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

[GibsonGM]

A theremin might be cool, there are some rather simplified versions of it out on the net.
You could build a phaser and warp some tunes, that might impress, lol. 
Do you have any examples of what others have done in other years, to gauge the level of complexity required of you?

[petemoore]

http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=309-150.

 For 3 a piece, lots of crazy ideas, see dude on the youtube dumping salt on a wave-shook-excited board [big board 6' or something...must have been one of the bigger yet similar drivers], creating ~symmetric and cool looking: changing phase/resonance patterns in the board, and the salt forms show it, I'm sure a scale model would work.
 They're pretty cool, I just got the Dayton Exciters, impressive sound from a Xmas card, so far that's the only accoustic substrate I've put it on.

[T1bbles]

Do you have any examples of what others have done in other years, to gauge the level of complexity required of you?

Some people have done theremins before. Others have made rack compressors, DI boxes, EQs etc. I really want to make something instrument-like, mainly something I can incorperate into my live shows, something I can 'play'.

Does anything come to mind?

Thanks guys

[Top Top]

What kind of music do you play? Does it have to be melodic, noisy, etc...?

Might help us to come up with some ideas...

Personally I have been really interested in making instruments lately - particularly string/electronics hybrid instruments and mechanical-electric instruments, so I could go on and on with ideas for that.

Lap steel with a sustainer system built in?

I had an idea to build an instrument, which maybe eventually I will get around to - the idea was to have a stringed instrument with a separate ebow-like driver/pickup combo for each string. There would be keys (tuned chromatically or something similar), and when you press the key it would lift a dampener off the string (or remove a physical barrier to the transducers in some way) and it would vibrate in that ebow/violin like sound - through pickups or maybe even just as an acoustically amplified instrument.

Otherwise, you can easily get some really crazy things going with a 40106-based electronic instrument - you can get six oscillators going from one of those chips. I have been thinking of building an organ-like (but weirder) instrument from a few of those chips.

Hopefully that gives some interesting ideas... post what you make here, or in the lounge!

[T1bbles]

The 40106 sounds interesting. It was heavily hinted that we need to steer well clear of anything which might be classed as 'woodwork' so it has to be kept strictly electronic.

My band could be classified under the banner of 'new prog' I suppose, but I like to add a bit of a darker, noisier, often heavier twist on it, the music is very up and down.

So anything which makes 'noise' would be marvelous, even better if it can be controlled in a musical sense; ie something that can be pitch/volume controlled or something which will create a rhythmic effect. This is why the theremin came to mind first; it can be used to create some whacky sounds as well as being useful as a fully functioning instrument with control over pitch and volume.

I don't know that much about electronic instruments as you can probably tell

[01370022]

For my final year project I tried to create the 'mother of all amps' a 200W Solid State (sorry to the tube guys out there) amp. It had a bunch of features including

output overload protection to protect against DC bias, turn-on popping and short circuits
power amp input automatic gain control to stop the main amp overloading
3 preamps with switching (clean, light overdrive and heavy crunch)
EQ controls on every preamp (bass & treble and a parametric control for mids)
6 independant FX (chorus, flanger, reverb, trem, delay, Phaser)
master volume
CD input and a DI output.

Turned into a 2 year nightmare (I came back to complete some other stuff) that I never finished. I learnt a hell of a lot about audio circuits though. Had more knobs and controls than I knew what to do with.

My original idea was to put all the FX onto a digital chip and have them controlled through that, but my professor talked me out of it, saying that it was a final year project in itself. Knowing what I do now, I'd agree wholeheartedly. But you could do a variation of the above or you could try the digital FX thing.

A friendly 'been there' warning though - it always takes longer than you think. 

[Top Top]

The 40106 sounds interesting. It was heavily hinted that we need to steer well clear of anything which might be classed as 'woodwork' so it has to be kept strictly electronic.

My band could be classified under the banner of 'new prog' I suppose, but I like to add a bit of a darker, noisier, often heavier twist on it, the music is very up and down.

So anything which makes 'noise' would be marvelous, even better if it can be controlled in a musical sense; ie something that can be pitch/volume controlled or something which will create a rhythmic effect. This is why the theremin came to mind first; it can be used to create some whacky sounds as well as being useful as a fully functioning instrument with control over pitch and volume.

I don't know that much about electronic instruments as you can probably tell

40106 can do six oscillators in one chip, which can be audio or LFOs and also be routed to modulate eachother. LFOs open the door to rythmic-like things, but maybe not as predictable as a drum machine.

Using that chip, you could use some photo resistors to make a light controlled theremin. I personally don't know much about making a true proximity-controlled theremin.

Thinking of rhythmic theremin-like instruments, there is something called the "drum buddy" made by a guy named Mr. Quintron which is a sort of drum machine made from light-controlled oscillators and a rotating can with holes punched to let the light through to alter the pitch. Google it, you will find some info...

Here is a page which gives a good basic start to designing something for the 40106 http://www.fluxmonkey.com/electronoize/40106Oscillator.htm

[T1bbles]

That 40106 looks super useful!

I've done a bit with true proximity sensors when I made my fuzz probe work-a-like so I know how to do that. Now I'm thinking of a 40106 based mini modular synth-like thing using proximity sensors for pitch and volume, like a theremin, but with a bit of 40106 FM goodness going on, for example, certain oscillators isolated for use as LFOs which can be banana plugged into another oscillator to create 'rhythmic' pitch variations or even FM synthesis.

So what we're looking at now is a box which will look much like the MFOS Wierd Sound Generator but with control surface (proximity sensor) inputs using a stereo jack cable which will function much like an expression pedal input which will control volume or pitch, or both if I build two surfaces, or one with two ouputs, you get the idea. As well as this there would be LFO sections which could be banana plugged in to modulate the original oscillators.

What else should go in? I'm thinking a filter section at least?

Most importantly is this sounding like a good idea?