The EyeHarp: A Gaze-Controlled Digital Musical Instrument

Frontiers in Psychology

Zacharias Vamvakousis¹ 

关键词: music performance;    gaze interaction;    digital musical instrument;    accessible interfaces;    disabilities;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00906

学科分类：心理学（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

We present and evaluate the EyeHarp, a new gaze-controlled Digital Musical Instrument, which aims to enable people with severe motor disabilities to learn, perform, and compose music using only their gaze as control mechanism. It consists of (1) a step-sequencer layer, which serves for constructing chords/arpeggios, and (2) a melody layer, for playing melodies and changing the chords/arpeggios. We have conducted a pilot evaluation of the EyeHarp involving 39 participants with no disabilities from both a performer and an audience perspective. In the first case, eight people with normal vision and no motor disability participated in a music-playing session in which both quantitative and qualitative data were collected. In the second case 31 people qualitatively evaluated the EyeHarp in a concert setting consisting of two parts: a solo performance part, and an ensemble (EyeHarp, two guitars, and flute) performance part. The obtained results indicate that, similarly to traditional music instruments, the proposed digital musical instrument has a steep learning curve, and allows to produce expressive performances both from the performer and audience perspective.

【 授权许可】

CC BY