Touch Takiya
This takiya (Hindi word for pillow) instrument was conceived as way of making a soft, expressive, and adaptable musical instrument, deep and interesting to explore while also fun, intuitive, and durable enough for a young child to play with. The result is a rectangular touch and motion sensitive pillow capable of measuring capacitive touch, pressure, and spatial position. The top of the pillow is embroidered with electrically conductive gold-plated copper wire in the shape of a combined peacock and lotus flower surrounded by a ring of petals. Each section of the embroidery is threaded with stainless steel conductive thread and wired into two MPR121 capacitive touch sensors. Beneath the touch sensors are pressure and motion sensors. The data from all sensors is then streamed via USB Serial or BLE to MaxMSP where the data is processed and routed to Wekinator, Ableton, and Touch Designer.
