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Operating Instructions

Motion Selector (requires Jitter)

This is the simplest program, and can be operated using a single switch. The performer chooses when to turn pre-programmed drum tracks on and off.

Press SPACE or click on the POWER button (top centre) to start. CLICK to turn tracks on and off.

images/Drumss

Blue Frog

images/bluefrog

Blue Frog was specifically designed for a man who could nod his head and operate a switch, but not in a coordinated way. It converts up and down motion into sounds in three different voices.

Press SPACE to start the program and CLICK the mouse button repeatedly to cycle through percussion, piano and bass guitar. MOVE the mouse pointer up and down to play notes. Different notes can be played by moving the mouse pointer on a vertical course to the left, right, and centre of the screen.

Honeycomb Melody

Honeycomb Melody requires more coordination between pointer motion and button use. With it, a performer can play the notes of a scale in any key and in eight percussive voices. The notes are laid out in such a way as to maximise the accessibility of the most common melodic combinations.

Press SPACE or click on the POWER button to start. SELECT a key by clicking on a note of the keyboard beneath the power button. This sets the red hexagon to that note, and makes it the tonic or first note of the scale (for example, C). The orange hexagon automatically becomes the second note (D). Then, in this example, the three yellow hexagons all become E, the greens become F, the blues G, the indigos A, the violets B and the pinks high C, an octave above the tonic. (The grey note is a useful accidental). Finally SELECT the instrument by clicking on the drop-down menu to the right of the screen and you're ready to perform.

Play by moving the pointer over a coloured hexagon and clicking the mouse button. The note will last until the mouse button is released. Holding down the mouse button and dragging the pointer around the grid will play multiple notes.

images/Hex

Head Guitar

This is an experimental mouse-controlled guitar.

Start by pressing SPACE or clicking on the POWER button. SELECT a key to play in by clicking on the keyboard to the right of the POWER button. MOVE the mouse pointer horizontally over the guitar "strings" to hear a chord. REPEAT this motion at different heights to hear different chords. HOLD down the mouse button whilst playing a chord to hear a slightly altered version of it. Experiment with the "cut off?" box to the left of the POWER button for different sounds.

Colour Keys

This is the most complex program and, whilst it is much harder to use than the others, it is capable of greater musical subtlety. Sound is created by the controlled movement of the mouse.

Start by pressing SPACE or clicking on the POWER button. SELECT key, instrument and major/minor from the menus to the left of the POWER button. The colour coding is the same as for Honeycomb Melody.

Perform notes by MOVING the mouse pointer vertically over one of the coloured rectangles. The volume of the note played increases with pointer speed, regardless of whether it is moving up or down, so a steady note of any volume can be played indefinitely by using a smooth oscillatory motion. All notes are silenced when the pointer horizontal motion exceeds its vertical motion, so MOVE the pointer from left to right to change notes or to maintain silence. Vibrato is added to a note if the mouse pointer is moved up and down at a sufficient frequency.

The effect of the mouse button on the sound is chosen by the performer from the menu at the top right of the screen. Experiment with what each of the three options does.

images/Chords

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Site last modified Tue Feb 19 16:10:54 GMT 2008