Hello again Martin and MMX fans, Maureen here from Meticulae Designs with another
version of the kinetic fingers. When I recently rewatched the first video where
Martin explains the fingers, I realized something. Listen to how he describes the
motion: What I want the machine to do is to lift these Tim Burton-esque visual
fingers and keep them still when the vibraphone is not playing and then I
want the fingers to fall down just like a piano player put his hands on the keys
of the piano and start moving for every note the machine is playing. This is not
what the machine is currently set up to do. The fingers do lift up when the
instruments are muted but they also lift up when a note is played instead of
rotating down like they're playing a key. Here's what they would look like with
this key pressing motion. Perhaps that other rotating-backwards
motion has been adding to the creepiness factor. I gave myself some very specific
design restraints and what's interesting is this new motion could potentially
address some of the issues that people have mentioned in the comments. To
achieve the key pressing motion. the best option for working with the MMX
as it is seems to be using gears. What you're seeing here is a small
section of gear that gets attached to this circular piece. The fingers would
slide onto a rod that would be welded in this position and then a matching gear
section would be on the finger. Properly made gears shouldn't add any stress to
the programming pins and should be pretty silent. Mounting them all on a
single rod means that they'd be removable for transport or for close-up
performances. When the fingers are actively playing they'll move like this
and when muted all the fingers will be pointing straight down. But check this
out: moving the pivot point here allows you
to do something really exciting. It now gives the fingers the function of
*actually being playable keys*! If you connect a rod here to this arm with the
drop knob and support it with another rod here you can actually push the
finger to push the drop knob arm to release a marble! The position of where
this rod can go will depend on how the muting system is connected to the circular
pieces, which I can't find detailed in any video, but I believe it should be
doable. So what if we went one step further and took the idea of fingers
playing keys out of it so that we're left with just the keys? What we have now
is a marble machine with fingerless kinetic fingers. This design follows in
the footsteps of player pianos and other self-playing musical machines.
Playable keys mounted in the front in this way gives the MMX an accessibility
that it hasn't had before. It should be easier to play chords, and maybe, MAYBE
even a slide. :) I'm sure those who think the fingers are too creepy are enjoying
this version but let's return to Martin's original vision and get the
fingers back in. The way to get the motion that Martin originally envisioned
is to keep the fingers separate from the keys. Doing so gives the illusion that
the fingers are playing the machine but it also retains the function of playing
the keys manually when the fingers are muted and in the up position. This rigid
finger could be mounted on this pole and directly controlled by the muting
mechanism, which from what I can tell goes here. They would be up like this
when muted, kept in place by a counterweight. When they're unmuted they
would pivot here and rotate down so the finger rests on the moving key and makes
it look like it's pushing the key. So let's see what this looks like when it's
all put together. I think I got pretty close to achieving everything on my list.
I hope everybody understands that I've been making these videos on my own and
that they're completely unsolicited. It's been so much fun figuring out how to get
these prototypes to work. I hope you've enjoyed this latest version of the
kinetic fingers and hopefully my brain will be able to rest now that I've
shared this new idea with you. Thanks for watching and see you at the world tour!!!