Smartphone Drum

2021. 10. 29

Smartphone Drum: Gesture-based Digital Musical Instruments Application for Deaf and Hard of Hearing People
スマートフォン・ドラム:ジェスチャで振動を演奏する楽器アプリケーション

Smartphone applications that allow users to enjoy playing musical instruments have emerged, opening up numerous related opportunities. However, it is difficult for deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) people to use these apps because of limited access to auditory information. When using real instruments, DHH people typically feel the music from the vibrations transmitted by the instruments or the movements of the body, which is not possible when playing with these apps. We introduce “smartphone drum,” a smartphone application that presents a drum-like vibrotactile sensation when the user makes a drumming motion in the air with their smartphone like a drumstick. We implemented an early prototype and received feedback from six DHH participants. We discuss the technical implementation and the future of new instruments of vibration.

Project Members: Ryo Iijima, Akihisa Shitara, Sayan Sarcar, Yoichi Ochiai

楽器を遊べるスマホアプリが出回り、気軽に演奏する機会が増えてきた。しかし、ろう・難聴者は音の情報を得づらいため、それらのアプリを楽しむのが難しい。一方で実物の楽器は、音だけでなく、楽器から体に伝わる振動や演奏動作からも音楽を体験できるため、ろう・難聴者にとって楽しみやすい。そこで、実物の楽器の「振動が感じられる」「体全体で演奏する」という特徴を楽器アプリに取り入れた楽器アプリ「スマートフォン・ドラム」を開発し、予備的研究を行った。本アプリでは、スマートフォンをドラムスティックに見立てて、空中でドラムを叩く動作をすると、まるでドラムを叩いたかのような振動が返ってくる。

プロジェクトメンバー: 飯嶋稜、設楽明寿、Sarcar Sayan、落合陽一

Contact / 連絡先:飯嶋稜(ryoiijima -at- digitalnature.slis.tsukuba.ac.jp)

▼ Download from the App Store
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/smartphone-drum/id1593538686

Ryo Iijima, Akihisa Shitara, Sayan Sarcar, and Yoichi Ochiai. 2021. Smartphone Drum: Gesture-based Digital Musical Instruments Application for Deaf and Hard of Hearing People. In Symposium on Spatial User Interaction (SUI ’21). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 2 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3485279.3488285