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World Sensing Music Station — reconstructed prototype A raised cardboard base, three visible breadboards, internal red and black jumper wires, two control boards, seven buttons, an ultrasonic sensor and a central LED matrix, surrounded by a translucent coiled NeoPixel strip. Power leads are tucked underneath.
Handmade instrument / digital reconstruction

Physical computing / experimental instrument

WORLD SENSING
MUSIC STATION

A handheld instrument for turning
movement and space into sound.

Enter the space

Movement → distance → music

SPACE
BECOMES SOUND.

Move the station to hear the distance.
Choose a layer. Record eight steps to keep a loop.

80 BPM

PLAY / Empty loops. Record movement or try Randomize.

Drag in the space, or use the slider. Speaker icon: mute.

Inside the instrument

Ultrasonic distance is smoothed into eight zones. Motion and mode determine rhythm, bass and melody. One layer is replaced for eight steps, then returns to PLAY.

The control board handles sensing, the 30-LED loop and time-sliced audio. Serial messages go to a second board, which scrolls text on the 8×8 matrix.

  • Ultrasonic sensor
  • LED matrix
  • NeoPixel loop
  • Seven buttons
  • Audio output
  • Control board
  • Display board

THE REAL
PROTOTYPE.

Exposed wires. A loop of light.
An instrument carried through ordinary space.

The real handmade station: a glowing translucent loop around breadboards, exposed wires and the LED matrix.
Demonstration / YouTube ↗
A person in headphones holds the glowing handheld station in a stairwell.
Movement through familiar space

FROM SKETCH
TO INSTRUMENT.

Drag or scroll the original sheets.

Original experiments with plants, water and fluid music.
FLUID EXPERIMENTS PDF p. 4
Original sketches explore a circular loop machine and ultrasonic sensing.
LOOP / SPATIAL SENSING PDF p. 3
The original storyboard develops the instrument as a handheld object.
HANDHELD INSTRUMENT PDF p. 9
Final device drawing with its NeoPixel loop, sensor, buttons and electronics.
FINAL PROTOTYPE PDF p. 10

PROJECT FILES

Design documentDOCX / Download ↓Process, research & sketchesPDF / Download ↓
Arduino sourceControl.ino ↓Display.ino ↓Project journal ↗