During O-Week this year, I was having a discussion with the band director at Rice and mentioned how recording is so helpful, yet how painful it is. Recording yourself while playing is difficult for many reasons. First, you need a device to record. Most people have phones, which are great, but they bring about another problem. A phone is not optimized for musical instrument recording. When you record with your phone, while you can tell pitches and rhythms, the tone quality is poor. This is due to its intended purpose: voice notes are intended for the human voice to get messages or memories to replay. There is a special type of mic called a condenser mic that is intended specifically for musical uses.
Mr. Throckmorton, the director of Bands at Rice, had mentioned the desire for a system where the band could be easily recorded using the condenser mics that the band has. He described a system where on an app you could hit one button and the mics would start recording. Then that file would be saved for playback and analysis after rehearsal.
After hearing about the EDES 301 Project 1, I was determined to use this project to solve that problem. While I did not have the knowledge of app development, I had cursory knowledge of Python. I felt this challenge was achievable.
The device interfaces with a couple of external components to be able to provide the 48V or "phantom power" that the condenser mics need to be able to work. The mics plug into the big mixer board, leaving room for six different mic connections.
Once the program starts, all you have to do is hit the red button to start recording. The red LED will light up, showing that recording is happening and allowing instant feedback on performance. Once you hit the red button again, the PocketBeagle will stop recording. All of these [recordings] will save to a folder that will allow you to access any recording by using the screen. Once you have selected the recording you desire by scrolling with the joystick, all you have to do is hit the blue button to start playback, and if the M-Audio system is plugged into a speaker, it will work. The program is set up to start on boot using crontab, so this system will turn on when the entire system turns on to increase ease of access for technologically-challenged band directors.
Comments