Audio d-touch: Tangible music software for all your music needs

Technology has actually made the world smaller and easier. Taking a photograph is no longer an exercise in getting the right lens, developing the film in the right light etc. similarly creating and recording music have become as simple as pressing some keys and shifting some sounds knobs. But as if human were always meant to be plagued by the old world charms, a lot of people often complain that technology is taking touch out. You don’t touch a pen but write novels, you don’t hold a violin but make music.But there are many who disagree and thus Dr Enrico Costanza, of such, from the University of Southampton’s School of Electronics and Computer Science has made a major breakthrough in bringing tangibility to creating music via computers.

d- touch interface

The Audio d-touch system that they have developed is giant leap. it transforms the music making activity on computer in an actual instrument playing experience. You must have played or seen those movement sensitive computer games, where you can play lawn tennis in your bedroom by making actual hand gestures through a joystick. This software pushes the envelope even further by giving you an unusual amount of control over the whole process of music generation. The music console is replaced by the computer, the webcam plays the part of a music reader, a printed sheet serves as the substitute for music style sheet and physical blocks are your fingers on guitar. The official term for the whole process is Tangible User Interface or TUI. Dr Enrico Costanza see this invention as an effort to add more depth to the whole experience of generating music on computer. The purpose is also to move into a purely digital world, with its own set of rules, styles and methods of creating music.

The music is created by the movement of the physical blocks. The movement of the blocks is tracked via webcam. Simple musical notes can be created by specific placement of the blocks. But you have to create physical interactive objects to print markers on them that are read by the Audio d-touch. The application is available for free and can be downloaded from d-touch.org.