Walking instrument concept · live beta

Music in motion.

An instrument in every pocket.

Not for finishing songs. For discovering them.

PulseTap is a musical sketching environment designed to capture a song while it is still becoming. Before production. Before perfection. Before the idea disappears. Define tempo, shape transitions, explore modes, build energy, and sketch structure in real time— so musicians can focus on movement, interaction, and emotional direction before committing to sound.

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III

Tap zones become notes, chords, percussion, loops, or walking-synced musical gestures.

Recent Project Updates

Field signals from the build.

PulseTap is not presented here as a finished product. It is an evolving musical research lab: a place where timing experiments, interface sketches, hardware ideas, and collaboration questions remain visible while they are still changing.

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Development Journal

Notes from the phase before the song exists.

The journal holds longer reflections about musical structure, emotional direction, browser-based sketching, collaborative trust, and the philosophy behind PulseTap’s design decisions.

Opening the development journal...

Philosophy

Structure before sound.

Music is not just sound—it is movement through constrained frequency space. A key defines the palette. A mode shapes emotional gravity. Tempo creates shared time. Structure creates expectation and release.

PulseTap exists in the phase before production: where songs are explored through interaction, tension, repetition, transition, and collective experimentation.

PulseTap exists before production—where songs are structured, not finalized.

Constraint creates clarity

PulseTap filters infinite sound into usable space—key, mode, and rhythm— so ideas can emerge quickly without friction.

Sketch, don’t finalize

This is not a DAW. It is where songs take shape: parts, loops, energy, and transitions—before production begins.

Emotion through motion

A song moves like a life: tension, release, surprise, resolution. PulseTap lets you design that journey before the notes are locked in.

From browser app to wearable instrument.

PulseTap starts as a web instrument, expands to sensors outside the phone, and grows toward a wireless cube-shaped controller.

Build the browser app

Playable pads, scale selection, local audio, session joining, Loop Mode, Save/Load/Share, and a host Song Board.

Now: software prototype

Add sensors outside the phone

Finger taps, rings, conductive contacts, motion sensors, Bluetooth MIDI triggers, or other hand-based inputs.

Next: wearable experiments

Create the wireless instrument cube

Six sides, customizable panels, motion control, programmable scales, waterproof durability, and wireless connection to the session.

Future: physical instrument

PulseTap Cube

A modular, tactile instrument designed for real-time musical collaboration.
Tap. Swap. Perform.

PulseTap began as a digital instrument — but it naturally evolved toward something physical.

A compact, rubber-encased instrument with 14 interactive panels, designed to be tapped, pressed, and played like a portable instrument.

Inspired by modular fidget systems, each panel can be removed and swapped:

Tap pads
Sliders
Buttons
Joysticks
Custom control modules

The outer rubber skin protects the device while allowing access to a flexible internal frame — enabling users to reconfigure their instrument for different play styles and performances.

Reserve Interest

The Cube

Small enough to hold. Deep enough to perform.

The outer brace protects the cube and creates recessed panels for touch-sensitive square pads. Each side can become an instrument, loop layer, effect surface, or control map. Corner panels can become mode, sync, record, send, mute, or shift controls.

1.5–2.0 inch handheld cube
Recessed illuminated pad panels
Playable faces, corners, and edge controls
Haptic feedback for every tap
Bluetooth MIDI / app connection

PulseTap instrument cube product concept board

Charging Dock + Accessory Hub

The cube needs a home base.

These dock concepts explore how the PulseTap Cube could charge, sync, store settings, organize swappable panels, and become a small studio hub when not being played.

PulseTap charging dock and accessory hub concept 1

Dock Concept 01

PulseTap charging base and accessory dock concept 2

Dock Concept 02

PulseTap App

The shared room where timing matters.

PulseTap separates two musical behaviors that should feel different: live play and loop mode. Live play is immediate and expressive. Loop mode is synchronized, count-based, and shared. Solo Mode stays local.

Live Play

Tap, improvise, audition ideas, and perform freely with immediate response.

Loop Mode

Prepare loops privately, then arm them for synchronized entry into the shared arrangement.

Solo Mode

Choose your own key, tempo, mode, and practice privately.

Room Sync

Multiple players contribute to one shared arrangement timeline directed by the host.

From fidget to instrument.

Fidget cubes proved that people love small, satisfying inputs: clicks, switches, rolling balls, buttons, and texture. PulseTap asks: what if those gestures could speak musically?

🧊

The fidget cube idea

Buttons, switches, rolling balls, and click surfaces give immediate feedback and keep your hands engaged.

⚡

The missing layer

A light switch click could trigger a note. A rolling ball could bend pitch. Five metal buttons could become five tones in a scale.

🎼

PulseTap’s leap

PulseTap blends the physical satisfaction of a fidget device with the expressive power of an instrument.

Built around movement, not menus.

Define timing. Shape parts. Build loops. Design transitions. Collaborate in structure before committing to sound..

☝

Finger-first input

Large tap pads trigger notes or percussion without complex menus.

🔁

Loop Mode

Record a short pattern, play it back, save it, share it, and keep adding live taps on top.

🎧

Headphone-native

Designed for private listening, walking, and testing with minimal setup.

👥

Collective play mode

Multiple users connect and turn individual tapping into a shared musical environment.

🎚

Switchboard control

The host becomes conductor and arranger—bringing players, loops, transitions, and sections into the performance at the right moment.

Players create privately. The host performs publicly.

🧩

Song Board

Host collects loops and arranges them into Intro, Verse, Chorus, and Bridge sections.

Play Together

One rhythm. Many voices.

PulseTap separates creation from performance. Players privately sketch loops, textures, and ideas while the host shapes arrangement, timing, transitions, and collective flow for the room.

Many Players

Everyone plays their way. All in time.

Player 01Melody

Player 02Bass Line

Player 03Percussion

Player 04Chords

PulseTap Switchboard

Master timing, mute, solo, volume, and routing.

Your Mix System

Plug in anywhere. Sound amazing.

Live MixerXLR / TRS Out

PA SystemStage / Venue

DAW / StudioUSB / Audio Interface

HeadphonesPersonal Monitoring

Song Creation Workflow

Less friction. More flow.

Traditional collaborative music creation is full of interruption: exporting files, explaining structure, resyncing timing, revising transitions, and trying not to lose the emotional momentum of the song.

PulseTap shifts the focus away from production complexity and toward arrangement, interaction, rehearsal, and shared structure.

Players create privately. The host performs publicly.

Traditional music creation compared to PulseTap collaborative arrangement workflow

Private Creation

Musicians sketch loops, melodies, textures, percussion, and harmonic ideas privately in headphones before contributing them to the arrangement.

Shared Structure

Tempo, key, mode, transitions, energy, and section flow become visible to everyone in the room.

Host-Led Arrangement

The host acts like a conductor: organizing sections, activating parts, shaping transitions, and guiding the collective performance.

Visualizer Rehearsal System

The visualizer becomes the rehearsal roadmap: showing sections, transitions, pulse, timing, cues, and arrangement flow for everyone together.

PulseTap cube connected to the app and Songmaker

Songmaker Integration

From playable loop to finished arrangement.

PulseTap is where the idea is shaped. Songmaker is where the idea becomes a finished song. One defines structure—the other defines detail. Songmaker captures intention. PulseTap turns intention into synchronized interaction.

Play a pattern on the cube.
Connect to a PulseTap room.
Collaborate with Lucy, Dax, Conor, and Ken.
Send the loop to Songmaker.
Build the final song arrangement.

Launch Songmaker

Session host & master control.

Every PulseTap session is guided by a host: a conductor surface where loops, players, sections, and transitions become a structured musical performance..

DaxPercussion

LucyMelody

Player 03Bass

Player 04Chords

Player 05Texture

MasterOutput

Phase 1 architecture

One host creates a room code. Players join from phones. Each phone plays its own tap immediately, then sends a timestamped event to the session server. The host collects loops, sees the room, and shapes song structure.

Original Spark

The visual direction

This early cube image captures the core design language: a glowing center, protective outer frame, recessed panels, and the feeling that the object is both instrument and artifact.

Reference cube image that inspired the PulseTap cube direction

A moment in motion.

A kid on a bus, skateboard at his feet, headphones on. He builds a beat by tapping, locking, and unlocking his cube. Later the beat is shared, expanded, played along with, and turned into a track. A rhythm becomes a song.

🚌

Create anywhere

Build beats, melodies, and textures on the move.

🌍

Collaborate across distance

Send ideas, layer sounds, and build songs with anyone, anywhere.

⏱

Shared structure over perfect simultaneity

Quantization and timing tools bring human input as close to simultaneous as possible.

Catch the song before it disappears.

PulseTap captures the framework of a song—tempo, key, energy, and flow—so artists can later bring it fully to life.

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