MIDI Glove

This project was an attempt to make a musical instrument you could wear on your hand. This glove consisted had an 9-DOF IMU and four bend sensors as inputs. I used Adafruit's Feather module with a small packet radio onboard as my microcontroller and wireless communications hub. I wrote Arduino code to collect the user's hand orientation and movements, as well as which fingers were bent. The angle of the hand determined the pitch of the note while the movements determined its velocity and throw to the left or right. Each finger activated a different MIDI channel which could each be programmed to a different instrument. The result was an intuitive device that could control up to four instruments at once in real time.

Tasks

  • Defined parts list and BOM with reasonable budget constraints.
  • Coded Arduino to read the acellerometer data and finger bend sensors in near real-time.
  • Integrated wireless communications over LoRa packet radio.
  • Developed a user interaction scheme that was intuitive for both musicians and non-musicians.
  • Converted sensor data to MIDI notes with low latency to provide a fluid playing experience.
  • Managed communication protocol in order to minimize lag and dropped packets.

Demo Video