by Ryan Linn

The musical pants project involves the instrumentation of a pair of pants with I-CubeX and other home-made sensors. The pants use two types of sensors so far, but more will be incorporated later. The first is the turn-dial, which is used to control the volume of the notes played with the pants. There are two turn-dials, one for each leg. Also on each leg are four custom-made-penny-sensors. The penny sensors are nothing more than a pair of pennies separated by foam insulation, and each hooked up to a wire. When the pennies are touching they complete an electric circuit and send an "on" signal to the I-CubeX. These are used to play musical notes 

The musical pants have four penny sensors in each thigh (from the knee up to the hip), and one turn dial on each hip. Wires from the sensors go to the I-CubeX, which is fastened to the pants at some point. The pants are not very mobile, because the I-CubeX must be plugged into a computer to work. Once everything is set up correctly, whoever is in Ryan's musical pants can play notes from one instrument by hitting the sensors on one leg, and another instrument by
hitting the other leg. The turn-dials can be adjusted so each instrument has a different volume. It works best when the volume is set above zero. Usually.

 14 november 2001