Developing an Image Scanning Sequencer

Overview

The main purpose of this sequencer project is to scan images and be able to play the image as midi notes.

Explanation

During the usage, the gray-scale of specific point of an image is measured using LDRs thereby triggering midi notes from a selected threshold. The velocity will be set by the darkness, when the threshold is reached at that point. This signifies that the velocity will be higher on the darker point.

The notes are played as an arpeggiator by the sequencer. This method of playback was chosen due to the lack of midi device that can play 24 keys at the same time. The arpeggio modes are categorized into two wherein the playback sequence is being arranged by one mode to the active notes velocities. The second mode changes the arpeggio playback speed to the amount of notes that are active. A potentiometer can be used to set the playback speed, if this mode is not selected.

There are 3 ADC ports on Arduino that are used to read the 24 LDRs of the sequencer through three 4051 ICs. The images are generated and played back on the sequencer by PHP script.