A Georgia Tech professor and an amputee drummer are teaming up to launch a Kickstarter to fund a robotic prosthetic arm capable of making music beyond human ability.
Jason Barnes, an avid drummer since childhood, was electrocuted while working on a restaurant roof in 2012. As a result of his injuries, doctors were left with no choice but to amputate his right arm.
Gil Weinberg, the founding director of Georgia Tech's Center for Music Technology, first heard about Barnes' story when the drummer emailed him six years ago, asking to create a robotic arm capable of performing music.
Weinberg, who specializes in developing robotics with artificial intelligence to inspire the nuance of music, thought that he could go even further than just a moveable, metallic prosthetic.
He and his team at Georgia Tech developed a robotic arm that could read the flex muscles' from an amputee's upper arm using ultrasound sensors to change grip and speed of a drumstick, allowing them to play like any drummer. In addition, Weinberg added a second drumstick to the arm controlled by artificial intelligence that's capable of making music on its own.
"He wanted to be able to have full control of the stick, replicating what his wrist used to do so he could make expressions," Weinberg said. "The second stick also uses artificial creativity and artificial intelligence to improvise and create music that will hopefully surprise Jason, inspire Jason and push his music to completely uncharted domains."
Though Weinberg's robotic prosthetic was everything and more that Barnes wanted, his dreams are not yet realized; the robotic arm is currently owned by Georgia Tech as a portion of the school's research, Weinberg said. The Kickstarter will fund the design and production of a second, duplicate robotic arm that Barnes would own outright and use to create music at speeds and tempos no human being can match.
Barnes will use the arm to tour and perform as a professional musician and backers to the crowdfunding will have exclusive access to music, videos and live performances to see "The Cyborg Drummer" play like no one else.
"It can play like no human can," Weinberg said. "Each of the sticks can play 20 hits per second, much faster than any human. Together, it’s 40 hertz. So it’s really fast, so fast that sometimes you can’t even hear the beats, you just hear sounds that no human can create. But what’s also interesting is that because it has two sticks….he can create all kind of sophisticated rhythms."
But the abilities of the arm go beyond music, Weinberg said. The patent-pending technology could end up being the only prosthetic to offer single-finger movement once it debuts on the market, he said. Because his team designed the arm for music---which requires detailed movement, pressure and position---it's capable of practically anything else, from grooming to typing on a computer.
"If it works in music, it will work in any other scenarios," he said.
Though the Kickstarter goal is high ($70,000 will go toward developing the robotic arm and $20,000 will fund Barnes’ first record with the arm), Weinberg is hopeful. As of Thursday, the Kickstarter has collected $3,415 total from 83 backers.
"I’m very excited about this kind of stuff---what this arm can do in the world of sound and speed," he said. "So I hope that at least one or two or all three of the reasons will appeal to people."
