Contact microphone can do amazing things on any surface

Jan 4, 2012 11:04 GMT  ·  By

The first time I saw this video, my jaw literally dropped. I mean, just check out what this microphone can do. Just attach it to any rigid surface, and it can produce sounds that you can record afterwards. If you're a music producer, then you can understand what this means for your sounds.

Researchers Bruno Zamborlin and Norbert Schnell say that their new microphone can be used either as a trigger – similar to a MIDI input, if you will – or as a synthesizer in itself. The cavity on the device allows it to interpret waveforms, and then turn them into audio signals a computer can recognize.

“Through gesture recognition techniques we detect different kind of fingers-touch and associate them with different sounds,” says Zamborlin. He adds that the device is capable of two audio synthesis techniques – either physic modeling or concatenative synthesis, Technology Review reports.

Just take a look at the video and tell us what you think about this in the comments section below. I sure know what I want for Christmas next year.