Android Theremin prototype *updated*

May 27th, 2010 Leave a comment Go to comments

"I'm so much cooler than you guys playing violins..."

Theremins are weird musical instruments. They consist basically of two antennas, the player moves its hands around it, altering the magnetic field. The device then registers this changing, playing creepy sounds. Take a look at this Pato Fu’s song and a lesson on how to operate a Theremin.

So I’ve bought an HTC Tattoo and of course, decided to try to develop apps for it. The whole SDK is amazing!

The concept of a Theremin can be implemented on Android, since the phones have a digital compass and registers the magnetic field in 3 axis (!).  Here is the first prototype and my very first Android app. yey! \o/

Its possible to change the magnetic field registered by this mobile using a coin. The closer the coin gets, the lower is the note. Actually real theremins work in the opposite way :)

*Update!*

Click here for the first version

Now, those notes are redered .ogg files of C scales =/ Android doesnt have a MIDI toolkit, right? I want to be able to produce my own frequencies, so the user could manipulate them like in a real theremin.

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  • http://www.Thereminworld.com Jason

    Looks great. Let us know at Thereminworld when it's all finished.

  • Anonymous

    Thank you, Jason. I hope you guys didnt take the joke about “creepy sounds” too seriously.

    Theremins are obviously much more than that. :)

  • ugosan

    Thank you, Jason. I hope you guys didnt take the joke about “creepy sounds” too seriously.

    Theremins are obviously much more than that. :)

  • http://www.planetandroid.com Ed Burnette

    Android does have a midi toolkit but it's kind of hidden. Try playing a .mid file in the MediaPlayer class.

    For varying the frequencies, try the SoundPool class, which has parameters for the frequency.

  • ugosan

    Hello Ed, I dont think SoundPool can manipulate frequencies, but the sampling (such as 20050, 44100). That doesnt help =/

    In this video i do manipulate the frequencies, but writing directly to a stream. BTW, I think my threading is all wrong, do you noticed some weird pops and clicks during the frequency changing?

    thanks anyway :)

  • http://twitter.com/osulop Olli Sulopuisto

    Oh my. You simply have to make this available, warts and all. Pretty please?

  • ugosan

    Thank you Olli, I'm actually making it nice to publish on the market, Im thinking on supporting it with ads. I will make another post here as soon as it is done. :)

  • Ugo

    Check the market for theremin! :)

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