
Misa: a digital guitar - chaostheory
http://misadigital.com/index.html
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aristoxenus
Electronic music still hasn't found anything near an ideal mode of performance
-- this guy's guitar may provide a glimpse into how that can be achieved.
Imagine a dionysian Jimmy Page up on stage, orchestrating a wall full of synth
processors on this light-saber of an instrument. Much more compelling than the
DJ-style performer stuck behind a control console.

~~~
wheels
This is far from state of the art for electronic music controllers; really it
looks like a toy. Synthesizer controllers / triggers that look like normal
instruments have been around (and used in performance) for 50+ years. And then
there are things like the theramin, which came out in 1928, which is a
physical synth controller.

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aristoxenus
What's great about his axe isn't that it looks like a normal instrument --
it's the way it maps touchscreen interfacing to the guitar form. I'm an
electronic musician too and have seen plenty of history and modern
experimentation; something that takes his touchscreen-guitar idea to the next
level (full touchscreen neck?) has much more expressive potential than a
normal guitar with a MIDI-transcribing pickup.

Plus it doesn't throw away one of the biggest lessons of rock: people will
scream for a guy with a guitar in a way that they won't for someone behind a
piano (or god forbid, a theremin).

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vorador
It reminds me of a dirty hack I made with a gtk guitar tuner. It's called
fretboard and it's supposed to let you use your guitar as an input device
under linux.

<http://github.com/khamidou/fretboard-old>

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emarcotte
Moog has a pretty interesting digital guitar guitar too, a fancy midi
controller:

[http://www.moogmusic.com/moogguitar/?section=product&pro...](http://www.moogmusic.com/moogguitar/?section=product&product_id=21130)

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NikkiA
More like Starrlabs' Ztar rip-off, really.

<http://www.starrlabs.com/>

~~~
GloryFish
They are clearly in the same genre of "MIDI controller in a guitar body". But
I wouldn't call it a rip off. The MISA is touch-screen based while the Ztars
include many different kinds of controllers.

From the looks of it, I think the MISA would make quite an interesting
addition to a stage show.

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sliverstorm
Wow, this is really cool... but I am not so sure I look forward to the day
things like this become mainstream.

It'd be _SO_ easy to fake even ridiculously complex performances, as by design
you can offload a lot of the skill onto the computer inside your guitar!

But, then again I suppose this is the same problem we have always had, and
always will have- computers vs. art and creativity.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
_But, then again I suppose this is the same problem we have always had, and
always will have- computers vs. art and creativity._

This is a false dilemma; computers and technology enable true producers and
artists to do more amazing things. The poseurs will get wrapped up the
technology and try to use it to paper over their lack of creativity, but the
real artists will find a way to harness it. Look at Pixar.

~~~
devin
I agree with you but I do sympathise with one creative dilemma I've run into
over and over again with digital music.

The number of options you have is overwhelming. On a certain level I
appreciate the number of options I'm afforded. On the other hand I feel like
'tweaking this' and 'changing that' takes a front seat, and the actual
production of something worthwhile gets left behind.

Take a look at all of the overproduced albums you hear these days. It's not
digital music's fault-- but it's a common problem.

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Torn
It's as much a guitar as a 'keytar' is. Still cool though.

