GetLoFi - Circuit Bending Synth DIY

CMKT 4 on Over the Edge Radio

Austin — Mon, 14 May 2012 14:44:58 +0000

CMKT 4 is currently on their West Coast Hackerspace Tour and will be joining Don Joyce of Negativland on KPFA’s (94.1fm, Berkeley, CA) airwaves this Thursday night at midnight! On the eve of our trip to the Bar Area Maker Faire, we’ll be adding noise with a variety of our circuit-bent devices, but you’ll be determining the flow of conversation with your calls – we want you to direct the conversation and join in the noise with YOUR devices. Is there any escape… from noise?

CMKT 4 on Over the Edge Radio:

Friday May 18 (Thursday night) 12am – 3am KPFA 94.1 Berkeley, CA

Listen live here: http://www.kpfa.org/streams/kpfa_24k.m3u

http://www.facebook.com/events/124776497647217/

Call from a land-line if you can, don’t say “Hello,” just start making noise:

510-848-4425

Come visit CMKT 4 at our booth at the Bay Area Maker Faire!

Experimental Garage Sale 5 on June 9 2012 in Chicago

circuitmaster — Mon, 07 May 2012 14:31:07 +0000

Photo by Katherine Guza

The date has been set for our 5th Annual Experimental Garage sale in Chicago, IL. On June 9, 2012 Electronic Kit Builders and Circuit Benders from Midwest and beyond will converge to showcase their latest products and part with their instrument prototypes.

If you have not been to the Experimental Garage Sale have a listen to Tony Youngblood’s excellent Theater Intangible Podcast about last year’s event. More announcements will be coming up shortly and we hope to see everyone there. Please show your support by joining our Facebook Event.

* Want to be a vendor? email me circuitmaster @ gmail.com to apply.

Tim Kaiser on Tour Spring 2012

circuitmaster — Thu, 03 May 2012 05:15:20 +0000

Our friend and experimental instrument builder Tim Kaiser is once again on tour with his new LP ”Number Stations” and a trunk full of custom Kalimbas. Please stop by to see him in the town near you.

SPRING TOUR:

> May 1- Studio 327 – LaCrosse WI <

> May 2- Super House Partay (sold out) – Chicago <

> May 3- Bela Dubby – Lakewood OH <

> May 4- Frequency Fridays at Wild Goose Creative – Columbus<

> May 5 – Rake’s End -Cincinnati <

> May 6 – Groucho’s -Louisville <

> May 7 - Brick Factory – Nashville

> May 8 – travel day <

>May 9 – The Shop – Pittsburgh <

> May 10 – B-Bop Records Art Walk After Show! – Toledo <

> May 11 – Mexicains Sans Frontieres – Grand Rapids, Michigan <

> May 12 - eSymposium – Chicago <

CMKT 4 West Coast Hackerspace Tour 2012

Austin — Tue, 01 May 2012 01:38:35 +0000

CMKT 4, the makers of Creme DeMentia Contact Microphones, are excited to announce their upcoming tour. The DeKalb, IL based Hacker-Space-Rock trio will be making their second appearance at the Bay Area Maker Faire in San Mateo, California. Along the way, they will be teaching a number of workshops at Hackerspaces, bringing their total of visited hackerspaces to 60 by the end of this tour. Notable events on this tour include a Sci-Fi Sound Workshop at The Roswell UFO Museum, a visit to the Mojave Makers at the Mojave Air and Space Port, and an appearance on Over The Edge Radio. Visit CMKT 4‘s Facebook Events Page for individual workshop details!

5/2 Ames Makerspace – Ames, IA

5/3 Columbia Gadget Works – Columbia, MO

5/4 OHM Space – Oklahoma City, OK

5/5 Dallas Makerspace – Dallas, TX

5/6 ATX Hackerspace – Austin, TX

5/7 10-Bit Works – San Antonio, TX

5/8 International UFO Museum and Research Center – Roswell, NM

5/9 Quelab - Albequeque, NM

5/10 (Flagstaff, AZ)

5/11 Heat Sync Labs – Mesa, AZ

5/12 SYN Shop – Las Vegas, NV

5/14 (San Diego, CA)

5/15 Build Shop – Los Angeles, CA

5/16 Mojave Makers – Mojave Air and Space Port, CA

5/17 Hacker Dojo – Mountain View, CA

5/18 (Thursday Night 5/17 Midnight-3am) Over The Edge radio show – Berkeley, CA

(listen here) http://www.kpfa.org/streams/kpfa_24k.m3u

5/19 Bay Area Maker Faire – San Mateo, CA

5/20 Bay Area Maker Faire – San Mateo, CA

5/21 John Haynes Memorial Veteran’s Hall – Garberville, CA

5/22 Ink Annex – Eureka, CA

5/23 The Curious Forge – Grass Valley, CA

5/24 Bridgewire Reno – Reno, NV

5/25 The Transistor – Provo, UT

5/26 (Boulder, CO)

5/27 Lincoln Hacker League – Lincoln, NE

If you’re near to one of the cities in parentheses above, contact us if you’d like to set up a workshop or performance:

cmktfour (atlas) gmail (dot) com

My Getlofi LTC 1799 Gameboy Mod for WOFF!

Austin — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 03:43:11 +0000

by Austin

I’ve had a Gameboy sitting around for a bit now, a nice, clean one I picked up at St. Vincent De Paul’s for $5. I wanted to add an LTC module and Pro Sound Mod to the Gameboy as a gift for my friend, Gary, who is one half of the team that brings you the Podcast Watch Out For Fireballs. I found the soldering to be simple, but met some other unexpected challenges – I hope seeing my process will help you readers out there who have a Gameboy slated for modding to better plan your project.

To get started, I had to open up the Gameboy, which ended up taking much longer than I anticipated. When I turned it over to get at the screws, I noticed it had proprietary 3-notch screws keeping the halves together. I would recommend either investing in a screwdriver that would fit these or you can do what I ended up doing: drilling off the screw heads at the drill press. Drill carefully and only as far as you must; the screws connect to plastic posts in the front half of the Gameboy and only one screw was still long enough for me to grab it after drilling. I backed it out with a pair of needle-nose pliers, then ground down the remaining plastic posts just enough to grab and twist out the other screw shafts. This was tedious, but had I bit the bullet and gone straight to drilling it would have been faster. Luckily, the Gameboy still fit together fine, even with the shortened posts.

One thing I would recommend is considering Getlofi’s specialty Gameboy LTC Pitch Modification kit which includes a space-conscious on-off switch. That said, the inside of the Gameboy is what I refer to as a “Space Nightmare.” No, Kthulu isn’t in there, it’s just a tight fit for putting more components inside. There is barely a 1/2″ wide column of space to work with going up half the right side from the bottom to use.

I wanted to use a push-on/push-off latching button in the front to connect/disconnect the LTC signal for aesthetics/usability, which was the first thing I decided to tackle. Hindsight is 20/20 and I would recommend leaving this operation for last, as it is the only thing aside from the screen ribbon cable that connects the two halves of the Gameboy, once open. Because I did it first, I had to contend with the button wires during the rest of my wiring, which was annoying. The ribbon cable can be carefully removed by hand. Be gentle, because damaging the leads will affect the display. I also had to route out some of the battery compartment for the button to be able to fit in place. If you choose to mount the button like I did, be careful when widening your pilot hole in the front of the Gameboy, I ended up chipping the Gameboy’s case where it is slit for the (removed) speaker – opt for using your Dremel rather than your tapered reamer to widen your pilot hole.

Getting the LTC’s potentiometer to fit inside was not too hard, though I did have to grind away the side of one of the plastic screw posts for space. The LTC module itself tucks nicely under the bottom half’s circuit board. I decided to attach wires to the LTC board instead of directly attaching it to the potentiometer. The LTC board tucks under the Gameboy’s board neatly, loose but blocked in place by the potentiometer. I ran wires in parallel to the potentiometer leads to the RCA jack at the bottom to control the LTC remotely. I did have to trim off a little bit of the RCA jack’s tip lug for the fit. I would recommend gluing the RCA jack in place inside, they can tend to twist around.

When it came time to put the Gameboy back together, I noticed that there were threaded metal nuts embedded in the screw-holes in the back half of the Gameboy. This is so that only screws with the correct threads can fit. I tried to find properly threaded screws at my local hardware store, but that didn’t work out – they are super small. I carefully drilled these nuts out with a slightly larger drillbit, taking care not to damage the circuit board, then screwed the Gameboy back together using screws from my tiny screw collection. Once again my jar of tiny screws comes to the rescue – junk toys can end up yielding a lot of these helpful little guys and other handy components. Skip the hardware store and go to the drill press, they won’t have the right screws any way.

Lastly I assembled a remote controller for the LTC in a bottle-cap. I added a latching on/off switch for the Photocell and two body contacts, both of which are wired in parallel with the on-board potentiometer using an RCA cable to fit the jack I installed. I ended up with a messy hot-glue job at first, because I had forgotten I had turned my glue gun to low. I redid the hot glue finish by gingerly zapping it with a heat gun, taking care not to melt the cap – nice and smooth.

It came together over a couple of days, though there was a lot of sitting and thinking before acting. Hasty screw-drilling can be a set-back some times, but I would highly recommend it in the case of the Gameboy. Also, speaking of drilling, make sure you clean all of the metal and plastic dust out of your Gameboy before reassembling, especially from behind the screen. I did so by carefully removing the front circuit board and using a little canned air. Also, protect your screen from getting scratched while you work by putting a piece of tape or a sticky note over the front it – something I forgot to do.

I hope these tips helped you plan your project, I know I learned a few things in making it. To help keep you entertained while soldering up your Gameboy, why not check out Watch Out For Fireballs? WOFF is my friend Gary’s podcast which reviews retro video games for your amusement! In other news, CMKT 4 is about to head out West for the Bay Area Maker Faire with a string of workshops, stay tuned for details!

Circuit Bent Beats – defame EP

tdomf_30b65 — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 03:31:04 +0000

Click here to view the embedded video.

This is what happens when circuit bending artist Nathan Monk meets hiphop producer Defame. Check it out. Share
http://defame.bandcamp.com/album/circuit-bent-beats

Spring Tour 2012 – Talking Computron , Ring Toss Twins

circuitmaster — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 17:34:51 +0000

Tour Dates:

March 29th, 2012 – Madison, WI – Dragon Fly Lounge

March 31st, 2012 – Columbus, OH – Circuit Bender’s Ball

April 1st, 2012 – Louisville, KY – Groucho’s Bar

April 3rd, 2012 – LaCrosse, WI - Cavalier Lounge

Tomorrow Talking Computron and The Ring Toss Twins will hit the road for our Spring Tour 2012 making our way down to Circuit Benders Ball in Columbus OH. Where we will be also teaching a workshop on building a Transistor Theremin. Bend a voice recorder workshop is also going on earlier in the day.

More information and complete lineup of events on Fuse Factory website. Please come see us on the road!

Circuit Bender’s Ball in Columbus, OH

circuitmaster — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 17:28:04 +0000

Our friends at the non-profit Fuse Factory in Columbus, OH are trying to bring us back for an event at the end of March. Please help support this by visiting the Kickstarted Donation Page, if you are into that kind of thing

CMKT 4 SE Hackerspace Tour 2012 and New Bending Buddies

Austin — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 19:48:38 +0000

Our friends in the band CMKT 4 are headed back on the road with a “Build an EconoMIC Bottle-Cap Contact Microphone” workshop and performance tour to the South East this February. This tour is jam-packed with Build a Microphone workshops/performances as well as several not-to-be-missed, multi-act shows! We’ve done workshops at over 30 Hackerspaces and by the end of this tour we will have done workshops at over 40 Hackerspaces! Check out our tour dates, like us on facebook.com/cmkt4, and see our events calendar there for the full details of every show.

CMKT4: “We have also updated our Creme DeMentia Bending Buddy circuit-bending probes. Fully assembled Bending Buddies are now available with a button in a variety of colors. They are now also available as a kit, which includes a comic adventure/instructions, a circuit-bending basics overview, and a parts bag – you supply the solder and hot glue. Visit getlofi.com/shop for all of CMKT 4′s Creme DeMentia products.”

CMKT 4 SE Workshop Tour 2012

2/17 – Louisville, KY –

CMKT 4 w/ Ben Traughber and No Copper,

Lisa’s Oak St. Lounge,
1004 Oak Street

2/18 – Knoxville, TN -
Mic Workshop, Technology
Cooperative, 130 W. Jackson Ave., 2pm

2/18 – TBA – Knoxville, TN Area

2/19 - Asheville, NC -
Mic Workshop, Mojo Coworking,
4 Wall Street, 2pm

2/19 – Asheville, NC – CMKT 4 w/ “Nightmare of Noise” Puppet Show,

and special guests Hellblinki,
Bobo Gallery, 22 N Lexington Ave

2/20 – Winston-Salem, NC –
Mic Workshop, Fablocker, 1020 Brookstown Ave #17, 7pm

2/21 – Raleigh-Durham, NC -
Mic Workshop, Splatspace, 331 W. Main St., Durham, 7pm

2/22 – Charleston, SC -
Mic Workshop, Makelab Charleston, 1370 Ashley River Road, 7pm

2/24 – Jacksonville, FL –
Mic Workshop, Shantytown Pub,
22 W. 6th St., 7pm

2/25 – Orlando, FL – Mic
Workshop, FamiLAB, 1355 Bennett Dr, Unit 129, Longwood, FL

2/25 – Orlando, FL – CMKT 4 w/TBA, Sip, 724 Virginia Drive, 9pm

2/26 – St. Petersburg, FL -
Mic Workshop, The Venture
Compound, 2621 Fairfield Ave. S, 2pm

2/27 – Atlanta, GA -
Mic Workshop, Freeside ATL,
675 Metropolitan Parkway
Suite 6066, 7pm

2/28 – Murfreesboro, TN - CMKT 4 w/TBA, Boro Bar, 1211 Greenland Drive, Free

2/29 – Nashville, TN - Mic
Workshop, Brick Factory, 209 10th Ave. S, Suite 126, 7pm

Introducing the LoFi Distortion Lab Kit

circuitmaster — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 17:00:48 +0000

LoFi Distortion Lab from GetLoFi.com/shop is our first OP-AMP based kit, specifically designed for easy experimentation with different value components. The goal of this circuit is to provide a simple modular distortion/amplifier unit for variety of audio sources like guitar, electronic instruments, and piezo contact microphones. At the heart of the circuit is a single low noise TL071 OP-AMP IC configured to operate from a single ended 9 volt power supply.

Once all the required components are in place on the PCB you will assemble the basic Tone Profile module by plugging in various parts on top of the included gold plated solder cup connector. This connector would then slide into a Socket next to the Op-Amp IC.

Pictured above is a Germanium diode clipping module with a 0.01uF High Pass Capacitor and a 100K Gain Resistor. Each one of these components can be replaced and tweaked when you create your very own Tone Profile. Various diode types such as Silicone, Zener, or Germanium will give you different audio clipping levels and with this kit you can try 1, 2, 3, or 4 various diodes to see what will happen with the simplicity of a breadboard. Once you are ready to commit, simply solder the components to the socket creating a swap-able Tone Profile module. A DIP converter boxes such as this can also be used.

Wait you say, “I am not seeing any knobs, how do I control the gain on this thing?” To make this design compact and innovative no variable controls are included. However it is easy to add a potentiometer instead of a resistor on the Tone Profile module to change the amount of OP-AMP feedback gain. Simply add a potentiometer to the top of the module or on the bottom of the circuit board. If you are using a guitar, the volume knob, tone control, and pickup coil selector switch will also drastically shape your sound without the need for any other controls on the circuit board.

For the first time there will also a complete schematic in our main howto.pdf file along with explanations for every component and why it is there. This knowledge to will enable you to start making your very own OP-AMP distortion flavors or simply adding an easy to assemble unique distortion effect for your arsenal. This module is here to stay so please order away!