Testing the tablet interface on an iPad.

First you choose the Polly Compose APP on your desktop. The first, Scenes & Things-screen, of three  in the APP opens (see picture to the left).
There you choose Scene (music and visuals) and Thing (Polly Ocean, Polly Fire, Polly Planet). Then hit the [play] button at the bottom (see picture left).

The second screen with the chosen thing in the middle opens (see picture in the middle). Here you can test out the and learn how to play on the thing and how it sounds, before sending the composition to be played on the physical thing at home. You build up a composition by hitting the sensors on the screen representing the sensors on the interactive physical thing. You can also specify how you want the action to be performed (fast, slow, slow etc.).  A composition is being built up and visualized over the play and send buttons at the bottom of the screen (see right upper picture).
You play your composition by hitting the [play] button. You send the composition by hitting [send], and you edit  (see left lower picture) and save and give it a name by hitting [edit] .
You can go to the first screen and choose another Scene or Thing by hitting  [back].

The sent Twitter Composition is received in the Interactive thing. In our example here Birgitta sends a Composition to Polly Planet (see picture lower right) and Polly Planet plays the music and light Composition.

In the 4th generation we try to accomplish, develop and realize as many of the ideas, suggestions and wishes as possible, that we have received from the users, care persons, families and experts from several fields throughout the whole project. These many ideas, suggestions and wishes have been articulated through participation in the many workshops, tests, interviews, discussions and observations during the whole RHYME project.

Some of the users’ wishes, such as dynamic microphone input to the music together with different forms of sensorial stimulating input sensors in a mobile interactive thing, has been a major technological challenge. These user wishes have compelled us to develop six different hardware platforms throughout the project, which was not something we planned to do, but had to do because of its importance for the users and music therapists.

Including direct light response and projection in the tangible objects has also been an important user demand that has been a great design challenge. We try to include and prioritize as many user wishes as possible into a new 4th generation of distributed and social co-creative tangibles with new shapes, structures, surfaces, hardware,  software, music, set design, positive experiences and mastery levels, personalization and interaction forms. Here are some pictures from the ongoing development process:

New hardware solutions under development:
   

New shapes under development:
   

New materials, surfaces and joinery under development:
   

New light solutions under development:
   

New APP with graphical user interface under development:
   

Therefore we have used much more time than planned on developing different hardware platforms and testing them out in diverse use situations. Here are some of the decisions we have made during the project based on our research and explorations:
– Communication protocol for musical events OSC (Open Sound Control), not MIDI.
– Mobile computer platform iPod Touch (OSX),  or Android.
– SuperCollider, not PureData or Max/MSP.
– Wireless communication  by Wifi not Bluetooth or Zigbee.
– 5 Volt usb connectors for all devices not multiple voltages and custom battery connectors.
– Processing as dynamic graphic generation not Jitter or other programs.
– Textile embedded surface mounted LEDs not LEDs with legs on the surface.
– Ribbon cable not Conductive thread.
– Embedded projector into the interactive thing, not wall projection.
– Embedded speakers and Subwofer, not external ones.

During March we will user test 3rd Generation of  RHYME Co-creative Tangibles at Haug.
3rd Generation of tangibles are mobile and all built on iPod Touch as the running computer. Additional we have developed several mobile breakout card (iDevice, jDevice and kDevice) to extend interactional possibilities with sensors and actuators like speakers, LEDs and vibrators. All music is programmed in SuperCollider. More information will come soon.

The second week of the course Sensorial and Musical interaction the students assignment was to develop new concepts of Musicking Tangibles. The Musicking Tangibles had to be wireless, interactive things, that motivated the whole family to music together in their home. The concepts should build on RHYME’s last developed hardware platform kDevice. kDevice is a Bluetooth based extention card to smartphone/ iPod Touch to add additional sensors and actuators like LEDs. The interactive music is written in SuperCollider, which runs on the smartphone. The six groups presented 3 new concepts each and a working technical sketch. The last week the students will develop one concept for the final presentation 2. November.

MusicalFieldsForever (RHYME development team Fredrik, Birgitta and Anders-Petter) were invited to exhibit at the Musicmakers event in Berlin 14. September 2012. At the event we made and staged an installation version of Reflect. Very many people came and tested and experienced Reflect, which gave us invaluable input.
Here are some photos of Reflect at the event.

          
Video illustrations of the prototype from Vimeo

Peter Kirn wrote about it on his blogg createdigitalmusic.com

Next generation will be mobile tangibles. We did not finalized testing of   Wave Orange, which is wireless and based on iPhone/iPod  and our own breakout card iDevice. We therefore continue on the experimentations of breakout solutions to Android and iPhone/iPod. First we have focused on finding one satisfying chargeable battery solution to run all the light, smartphone and breakout card on one single battery, which means we have to rebuild and redesign the light solution based on 5volt .

The second platform we call RHYME Wireless. It is based on an Android Smartphone and Arduino ADK. ADK is short for Android Open Accessory Development Kit, and is Google’s I/O platform for connecting new hardware devices to Android phones.  RHYME Wireless can run with or without the RHYME Master, and this decide the possibilities for interaction and collaboration with other devices on the Internet.

The third platform we call RHYME Wired which is wired to the power network. This opens up for exploring more power depending sensory possibilities in sound, tactile stimulation and visuals.