KINote was a project for CS247: Human-Computer Interaction Design Studio. Charged to create a novel experience using the Microsoft Kinect, we decided to make a new instrument -- one that was not a direct analogue of any existing instrument, but one that your could use to make novel and beautiful music without a huge learing curve.
We initially decided on a name for our group: Team DazzleMix. Below are two mockups of what our team logo might look like.
Our final project and branding appears below. The KIN calls back to the Microsoft Kinect logo, while the colors indicate a sophisticated playfulness.
One plays the instrument using the left arm to choose the chord, and the right arm to strum. Volume is determined by the velocity at which the right hand crosses the vertical bar.
Below is our prototyping process. We started with an idea -- one hand to control the notes and one hand to control the playback. this lead to some very different prototypes: using fingers to mimic guitar chords and strumming as well as touching fingers to the thumb to indicate which note to play, and having a simple, if abstract hand-motion to indicate "play".
We then took the second concept into a more asbtract space, which eventually lead to the bottom two designs. The final project actually had two modes: a radial mode, where the chord was determined by the angle of the arm, and a vertical mode, where the chord was determined by the height of the left hand.
After adding some user feedback (the strum bar turns the color of the chord it will play and the selected area is highlighted) we ended up with our final iteration of the KINext, as above.
