Towards touch screen live instruments with less risk: A gestural approach

Abstract

Although touch screen interfaces such as smartphones and tablet PCs have become an important part of our life and are being used in almost every situation, these interfaces are facing some difficulties in being used in live musical performances, despite the numerous benefits they can musically offer. Among those difficulties, we identify and focus on the visual dedication requirement of interaction and nevertheless high risk of making mistakes, and design a simple musical interface aiming to alleviate these problems. In order to reduce visual dedication, we employ larger on-screen controls. To reduce risk of mistakes, we choose a gestural approach and incorporate plucking gestures, which require users to pull and release a touch after initiated. The interface is qualitatively tested, focusing on playability, visual dedication, and risk of making mistakes. While playability and risk received positive feedbacks, reducing visual dedication received partial agreement and seems to require further investigation. Although the interface is yet immature and too simple to be used on stage, we believe that identifying and solving the problems that touch screens have while being used in live situations is meaningful and valuable to discuss.