Added: 3 years ago
From: kenmoore
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  • Ahhh! I wish I was 100x smarter so I could make this! -unfortunately technology seems to hate me... and yet I love it...- but anyway, impressive work. :)

  • I know this is a stupid question, but did you make the pitches exponential or linear in relationship to the X axis of your had movements? (I'm sure you did exponential but just checking)

  • @judefox2010 No, the pitches are linear. Linearity is a quality of a good Theremin -- you want the same distance between pitches regardless of the octave, so that muscle memory learned in any one octave can apply to others. In that respect the Wii Theremin is superior to all analog Theremins as it's purely linear!

  • @kenmoore okay see, I always learned that exponential is the way to go. Think about musical pitches in real life, each octave is twice as high as the one before it, if they were linear the distance would be constant, not doubling every time. You ought to try making your theremin exponential as long as it's not to hard (I have no idea what language you used blah blah blah) and see if it changes the playability at all

  • @kenmoore Well since each octave is a doubling in frequency then equidistant octaves would mean exponential scaling in pitch.

  • @judefox2010 so basically if it's exponential each octave will be the same width in space rather than each octave being twice as long as the one before it... i think. Might be totally off on that one lol

  • can u imagine if that thing went off in the night?? HOLY FUCKBALL

  • this plus the doctor who theme on it deserves a sub. even tho u were off pitch in DW

  • just AWESOME!

    

  • "And i just wrote a program"

  • @TheMachineWP76 Right?! He makes it sound like it's a piece of cake. I'm crazy impressed.

  • so... ken... how much are you selling that code for?

  • @paulyhart Make an offer I can't refuse :)

  • you are great sir

  • Link doesn't work. can you please upload a tutorial? I would very much like to build one of these on my own. Thanks

  • @1Celebrindor Hi, I've fixed the broken link. I dont have time to upload a tutorial, it was a VERY involved project and life is very busy these days with other demands, sorry.

  • @yeahyeahyaha2 Thanks for the compliment :) The synth is digital - I map the wiimote input to pitch bend to get smooth in-between pitches. Unfortunately the wiimote only retrieves the X and Y coordinates of the infrared dots, it can't tell how close or far they are, so a perfect simulation just isn't possible.

  • @yeahyeahyaha2 Thanks for the compliment :) The synth is digital - I map the wiimote input to pitch bend to get smooth in-between pitches. Unfortunately the wiimote only retrieves the X and Y coordinates of the infrared dots, it can't tell how close or far they are, so a perfect simulation just isn't possible.

  • god that instrument is so fucked. listen to it at 2am and you wont sleep for a very long time

  • @c4r50n1 no, that's not inferred, that's just a regular camera.

  • THEN SURELY! You could apply the same use of technology to wireless control of a computer. eg minority report gloves?! This is genius please do something like this with the Wii remote!

  • @GotToLoveAlex We don't need minority report gloves. Have you seen kinect?

  • @c4r50n1 i have one. there freakin awesome!!!!!!

  • @ghoulia21 They need to make a game called "theremin hero" (like that one dude) and the controller is a theremin that says "Kinect" on it.

  • @c4r50n1 Did you see my Kinect Theremin Sneak Peek? watch?v=RHFJJRbBoLw

  • @kenmoore Holy crap!!!

  • does this go against any copyrights laws?

  • you're cool man!

  • great job bro!! any chance to open source your soft?

    there are other soft doing this too GlovePie and the OSCulator alternative so why not share with the rest of us? take care

  • youtube.com/watch?v=ESDzYYl0__­s

  • DUDE am i on acid or is your forehead really glitching?

  • I've watched this so many times....and I'm still just as impressed. That is so cool. I seriously wish I knew how to write computer codes like that...or any computer codes for that matter. Hmmm....is this the simplest way to do it? Or is this pretty much it?

  • @SqueakyPanther I've tied together a few complex systems here and it took me a great deal of study to be able to do that. I'd be surprised if there were a simpler way to get this result, sorry :^(

  • @kenmoore Buy a mini-theremin for about 20 $

  • @kenmoore Do you have a regular theremin?

  • @c4r50n1 Yep, an Etherwave Pro Limited Edition :) It's the bomb.

  • @kenmoore Can you post a video of you on it?

  • @c4r50n1 It'll be some time before I do, free time is in short supply lately.

  • @kenmoore D: Now I'm sad.

  • @kenmoore But you'll still do it, right?

  • genius.

  • nice work and presentation!

    thanks

  • Genius.

  • This makes fkin epic DnD monster music ^_^ I needitz.

  • Ken, this is very very cool, you deserve much applause.. but feel like sharing? If not letting the software out for free than perhaps charging whatever for it? I would certainly buy it, it would easily become my favorite MIDI method. Proprietary is so 20th century.. everyone is getting squeezed and there's not much time left before this is a 3rd world nation. Why not spread the love and fun? Let the people enjoy Armageddon.

  • great video

  • Actually, the very first electronic instrument ever, was the Intonarumori by Luigi Russolo, and had its debut in 1913.

  • @DJK0N3X0 Interesting -- hadn't heard of the Intonarumori. They/it clearly predate the Theremin, but not the Telharmonium which was invented in 1897.

  • @kenmoore

    hey this is really great work!! with the visualization on screen it would be possible to show the right position of your hands on screen to improve or practise.

  • Intonarumori was a hand-cranked mechanical noise-making instrument. It wasn't electronic.

  • @DJK0N3X0 actually your wrong its the Clavecin Electrique built in 1759 by Jean-Baptiste Thillaie 

  • @DJK0N3X0 The Intonarumori was mechanical, not electronic

  • ur a freakin genius!

  • This is awesome! So clever, so cool. I'm always amazed at how clever and creative people can be, kudos to you!

  • I want your brain!!! lol

  • Brilliant!

  • YES....you could make a theramin "score" I imagine, so others could "read" your composition by trying to follow the "score", without having to learn to read music...

  • 3:58 he's like: yeeeah i like what i did >:)

  • lol daft punk

  • Should sell the idea to Nintendo for a very large fee. o:

  • "...A whole world of hacking possibilities". XDDD

  • Nintendo, now your playing with power.

  • your forehead appears to be twitching.

    on a different note, hot damn.

  • Comment removed

  • I Think this is awesome. I would like to do something entirely different from a Theremin though (even though a therein IS a nice instrument) - another kind of MIDI controller - controlling other parameters pitch, expression, breath, modulation, filter cut-off, resonance - the possibilities are mindboggling :-) - have you explored the 3D capabilities?

  • where can i get this software after 5 hours trying to write a code like that myself i gave up lokl

  • @YQLbeast well... coding yourself is really the only way... unless you break into my home and take my laptop (but it wouldn't be pretty, my 10 month old girl has razor sharp teeth and attacks on command)

  • @kenmoore

    he would need to grab the synthesizer too as it is specific, you ought to release the code so that people with syntesizers who are so inclined can adapt it.

  • @kenmoore What program so you use to write the code?

  • @yeahyeahyaha2 I wrote it in C# using WPF

  • Thanks so much for an awesome video!!! I love all instruments and how we can tweak them....but a Wii mote? Funny this is, you don't look like a mad scientist at all! The one sound (that scares your wife) kind of reminded me of what Ronnie Montrose was doing on guitar at the beginning on "Space Station #5" on the first Montrose album....album! I just aged myself. Thanks again....that's fantastic!

  • Sooooooooo awesome!!!!

  • sell this to nintendo

  • Dude u should totally sell this! I would buy it!

  • Genius.

  • sweet

    

  • Nintendo attacks again.

    Thanks for the demonstration, you're a Master :P

  • You're Hug Grant!!

  • hahaha that face was very scary

  • CBC s Vinyl Cafe had a show a while back with a guest band that used the theremin to wonderful effect. I feel it will be incorporated into more mainstream uses...

  • Wow! Thanks to people like you there is progression in the world. Good for you!

    P.S. I was getting all set to buy one of these 'Wii add-ons' for my husband. I hope you have your design protected.

  • wii remote is awsome!if you know how to code!

  • Honestly, those sound effects kind of creeped me out. :V

    Theremin is legit.

  • you make my brain hurt lol

  • paul mc cartney still lives!

  • genius

  • thanks ken m, amazing device, i guess the question on my mind and has probably been asked before, have you made the program you've written accessible to ludites like me who just wanna blend eerie sounds with happy melodies etc? hey, we all have our forte. thanks again kenmore, very intense face! :)))

  • @macadder09 Sorry, the code is specific to my Roland JV-1080 synth and since I'm a new dad I don't have time these days to further the project. Glad you enjoyed the video though :)

  • "this face scares my wife" lmao thats exactly what i was thinking

  • @doxxy1 Yeah, it's very Kevin Spacey from Unusual Suspects.

  • I would LOVE to be able to do this. I have a synth and a wii remote. Can you help? I'd play this live!!!! Id shoot video at the gigs and credit you!!!

  • That's great man! Quite brilliant!

  • So how did you translate that to MIDI ? Kinda jumped 12 steps there ... and I am old, slow minded and feeble brained.

  • how much and where do I send my money

  • howly crap! this is insane!!

  • sometimes.. technology ruined Histories

  • that was pretty awesome. what i enjoyed the most was your face while making the sounds... you sure have multiple orgasms while doing it! :)

  • Lol he wrote a program , u don't know how hard that is

  • That is INCREDIBLY cool! Kudos to you for your awesome idea.

  • this instrument was used in legend of zelda: twilight princess  to make the leaf instrument have its sound its awesome

  • So, as I already said I've build a Wii Theremin / Effect machine / Light -> Sound converter which is capable to produce MIDI output. This works with any synthi out there: Video ID = y_0xRnhJpLU or in video responses if ken approves :)

  • Has your program or design been bought yet? Just curious :)

  • I know what software you used to write the program, I used it to make the remote controll an online game. I think it is called glovepie

  • Wow.. You could make a mouse out of that! Magic!

  • @TechDawgJr I tried making an IR-LED ring to use as a mouse... it was very awesome except that it was very hard to use. It turns out it's really hard to position your hand in the air accurately, compared to with a mouse where the motion is constrained to a 2D surface. This is the reason nobody is marketing and selling the Air Mouse... it's not a lack of technology, just that it's a bad experience.

  • @TechDawgJr The airmouse project was a good concept but the fact it uses a accelerometes instead of a local gps type module makes it alot worse. I suppose you could check on vectors on x & y axis only.

  • You have a wife?

  • @Dymys200 Yes, sorry, I'm taken.

  • @Dymys200

    Is it that special to be married as an intelligent person?

    You know, the times when only the dumb high-school jocks were getting the girls are long over, if they have ever existed at all. Maybe all they got were the equally dumb bimbos ^^

  • Ok, your right i shouldn't have used that many exclamation points but Nintendo is fairly adamant about calling it the Wii Remote, not wiimote. But come on wiimote doesn't sound right.

  • It's Wii Remote!!!!!!

  • @norb7771 Six exclamation points? Given how much you obviously care about this subject I have some devastating news for you: there are 2.7 million hits in Google for the word "wiimote". But with your passion, perseverence and keen persuasion skillz, I'm sure it wont' be long before we're all "Wii Remote" converts. Thanks for your service! ;0)

  • @norb7771 I've met and talked to a lot of gamers, and they all call it a wiimote. It's just so much more fun to say, lol. Even in game stores when you buy a wii console they ask if you would like to purchase another wiimote. What's so wrong with calling it that? It's just like how people call an iPod Touch an iTouch even though that's not the name. Society just likes to put words together.

    You can either learn to adapt to our ways, or live with the dinosaurs, lol.

  • @matrix86 your right but I'm kinda of a perfectionist is all

  • @norb7771 wiimote

  • Holy Shit dude! Your like McGuyver!

  • @XPetiePieX Hey there, what's your source? From what I've read the instrument's creation spanned many months so there may not be a concrete single date upon which we could all agree it was 'invented'. However, I'm interested in learning more about the specific events, so please share. (since producing this video 1919 is the year I've seen most quoted)

  • Okay nice... I build an whiteboard hack with wiimote and IR-LEDs last year.I Put an IR LED in a biro. Clicking the biro turned the LED on / off. I wrote a software similary to yours and was able to display the desktop on the wall by beamer and controlled it by LED-Pen. It was amazing but just some kind of funny experiment.

    But this one is amazing. I will buy IR-LED's again and build an MIDI interface to Logic Pro :) This will multiply the possibilities by times :)

  • @krymel1 Sounds great, please share the videos when you've got something to share!

  • @kenmoore Key, I got it working but need to stabilize it. The Guitar Hero Controller fpr Wii now works as a real e-Guitar by sampling real guitar sounds through Logic Pro. Sounds amazing! Also EXS24 synthi produces nice sound results by transforming the X / Y IR coordinates into MIDI data... but I need some time for first alpha release...

  • Jesus Christ, I feel like a shit-head watching this. I would have never been able to whip up something like that. Very impressive.

  • this is so awesome! we talked about the theremin in my music history class today and i'd love to show my professor this. you're helping 21st music evolve!

  • woa wait.....how do u have a wife

  • "This face scares my wife" LOL

  • the force is strong in this one

  • You do have kind of a scary face, but obviously you're very smart

  • And also, maybe if you can tell us how you set it up and stuff, lol.

  • PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE CAN YOU LET US GET YOUR SOFTWARE!!!!!

    I wanna do this for 2 of my classes as an example!!!

  • @Pacmanvice Hi there - I wish I could help you out but the software works specifically with the Roland JV 1080 synthesizer (an old, costly piece of hardware)... so there's not much I can do to assist, sorry :(

  • @kenmoore oh....ok, lol. I think i understand what your doing enough so i can toy around with what I do got. Which isn't much, LOL!

  • I love the bit about your wife being scared of that serial killer concentration face you do :D Other than that, the wii-theremin looks bitchin.

  • Man, you have too much free time! But this is awesome ^^ GJ

  • That is tremendously awesome.

  • well at least you don't have too much time on your hands

  • your so damn cool.. i had no idea that the 6 wii remotes in my house were quite so powerful.. lol.. very cool shit man,..

  • are u nerd?

  • @henrique2k Yes, i are nerd.

  • Wa....i want the software for my personal project,so that i can show it on event...

  • i like ur doctor who theme thingy

  • thats awsome man

  • @riomigz1305 Thank you! Well, it wasn't as much of a discovery as a lot of tedious hacking and studying the different technologies I stitched together. Glad you enjoyed it.

  • wow man, you're so brilliant! Did discover it yourself?

    I say youv'e done a great job :)

  • @kthxbainao In an effort to perfect the accuracy of my simulator I bought a real Theremin to analyze its waveforms and interactions. Unexpectedly I fell in love with the instrument and am now an avid student! A recent version of my software indicates which pitch is being played, but it's clear to me that playing by vision alone can never come close to the musicality one can achieve when playing by ear. It'd be like trying to create a masterpiece using a paint-by-numbers kit. :)

  • Have you considered writing a program for achieving "sheet music" of sorts? The theremin is notoriously played only by ear, but since you have the hand positions displayed on your monitor, you could theoretically display place-markers onscreen at the points where you are producing the desired note. Having that as a guide you could move your hands to that point in the future. Or even just markers indicating where semitones are. That way you could maintain a level of tonal consistency.

  • Very clever & interesting, indeed.

    But... Why stick to theremin configuration? (right back & forth is pitch and left up and down is volume)?

    It could be very interesting by involving right hand up & down for filter cutoff frequency and left hand right & left as modulation wheel, for example ?

    Let's keep in touch, will you?

    Thx a looooooot !

  • That's a great idea. Given how tough it is to actually play notes in tune on a Theremin I'm sure adding a 2nd dimension would require serious ninja skills to perfect :) Still, for sound effects that could be pretty powerful.

  • Are you a genius?

  • Neat. It might be a bit tricky to calibrate but, since you already have it set up to show your hand position on screen, you might be able to add some sort of grid to help show what note you're playing.

  • dude sell that thing to nintendo

  • pretty cool

  • @forensics098 Hm, I've seen reports that the Theremin was invented in 1919, and others that say 1920... what's your source? (I'd love to know the actual date).

  • it was invented in 1917

  • you lost me at "this is a theremin"lol

  • you are brilliant!

  • You know you can purchase an *actual* theremin kit, right? Also - you should write this up and send it to O'Reilly's Make Magazine. It's right up their alley. Don't let anyone say you're too geeky - my husband hacked our Roomba to be operated remotely via a web interface and webcam mounted to the top of it. He can spy on me from work while simultaneously vacuuming... LOL.

  • AWESOME!! Perfect for controlling those analog beasts I've been hanging onto for years now... :)

  • Nice one

  • i would love it if its possible to use the speaker inside the wiimote

  • your out of control man!

  • Wow!

  • You kinda remind me of Data from Startrek, Think it's the way you talk. Watch this 3 times in a row can't get enough!

  • You Rock!

  • God, you are such a nerd! That's a compliment, I'm really jealous and I want one of those. Five stars for awesome.

  • In the video what the heck was with your forehead vibrating weird???

  • Sadly, I have a rare condition where my forehead vibrates quickly when I talk about the Theremin.

  • LOL. It's the lighting. Look at the light at the bottom left, it's doing the same thing.

  • 3:25-3:35 and 3:55-4:02 sound like the voices inside my head..... haha

  • Amazing!

  • Damn, That's neat!!

    Cool!

    Yes it IS difficult to master!!!

  • and proud of it :^P

  • whoa!!! you should be!

  • @Sasuke1OOOOOOOOOOOO

    I wish I was this nerdy

  • and more creative and productive than you?

  • holy crap you are a genius, I need to check your web site, hope you are not an alien

  • very cool! i love the sound of the theramin so seeing it made from the wiimote is cool

  • its even weirder how you just move your hands to make those strange noises

  • You should put three IR LEDs to different fingers in your pitch hand, so you'll be