A digital-physical tool that enables the creation of collaborative musical jams among employees.
What is it?
Alongside the many technological solutions that allow for work from home, the difficulty of formulating and creating life support among remote workers remains. MELODY is a digital-physical tool that enables the creation of collaborative musical jams among employees. A group of co-workers coordinate time and at the beginning of the session each group member randomly receives a digital set of sounds as well as his or her turn in the session. The first participant sets a specific rhythm, after which each participant adds their own musical section corresponding to the set rhythm. In order to make it easier for users with no musical background as well, the software helps them keep pace by sampling their clicks and adjusting to the appropriate rhythm.
The session ends after about 3 minutes and all members of the group finish recording their part. The recording rises to the cloud of the company and can be saved or used again.
Project Info
Students: Eden Bar-Tov, Gad Stern, Gal Eshchar & Shahar Agassy
Lecturer: Oren Zuckerman, Noa Morag
Technological lecturers: Zvika Markfeld
Teaching Assistants: Netta Ofer, Michal Leshchinsky
How does it work?
Melody is based on ESP2866 hardware, which communicates with a Node-Red server over MQTT protocol. The device translates the player's notes into a string of characters that is sent to the server and from the server back to the other players. This allows everyone to play and hear the tune without interruption from their network connection.
In Melody, there are two main visual indicators. The first is a LED strip that lets the player know when Loop starts and when it ends and indicates if it’s the player’s turn. The second is a LED display in the center of the product, which is used to visually display the existing tune. A countdown from number 3 will be displayed to indicate the start of a new game, and then the timings will be displayed to help the user decide when and how he or she wants to contribute to the group’s Melody.