Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Show HN: I built a synth for my daughter

bitsnpieces.dev

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 216 posts

Re: Show HN: I built a synth for my daughter

#71

Post by haldean »

tanepiper wrote: post #11

I'm a 44 year old man and I would love this - for years I've tried to dabble with music with much lack of success - but this looks really fun to play with. Great job.

If you want a synth you can buy that has a similar playing style, you could check out the Modern Sounds Pluto: https://www.modernsounds.co/pluto (the original run is sold out but you can find them on ebay/reverb)

It's two of these 4-note step sequencers with some fun timing randomness. Similar to the OP's synth it uses knobs to set pitches but the knobs are picking notes from a specific key so they always sound good together. It's a lot of fun to play and doesn't require any musical knowledge!

Re: Show HN: I built a synth for my daughter

#75

Post by fiatpandas »

Thorrez wrote: post #12
fiatpandas wrote: post #9

Regarding case material for productizing, you could consider a combination of plywood and bent sheet metal, eg like a Moog. Also check out dato.mu for a few examples of kid proof synth enclosures.

Would bent sheet metal have any sharp corners or edges? For kids it's probably best to avoid those.

You can debur it as part of the manufacturing process, and then when it gets powder coating it smooths out even more. But you can just embed the sheet metal edges in a groove on a wooden side.

Re: Show HN: I built a synth for my daughter

#78

Post by analog31 »

elric wrote: post #60
fainpul wrote: post #32

> A 3D-printed enclosure is fine for a prototype, but a real product likely needs injection-molded parts, which require expensive tooling. For kid-friendly toys, yes. But for older users not necessarily: https://teenage.engineering/products/po

Wood is also pretty child friendly. But neither injection molding nor carpentry will protect a synth from a child dunking it in a puddle of water.

That's what backing up the design is for. ;-)

Re: Show HN: I built a synth for my daughter

#79

Post by gpm »

simgt wrote: post #73

As someone who has never 3d printed anything, I'm surprised by how clean the case looks as opposed to what we usually see. Why is it so smooth?

The surfaces you're seeing in the pictures are almost all the "bottom" surface that was printed directly on the build plate. It basically just picks up the texture of the build plate and is otherwise smooth. That's actually a fairly bumpy build plate they printed it on (which lots of people like for aesthetic reasons).

That said modern 3D printers are good at producing pretty nice parts these days, especially if you print with small layer heights. You might be underestimating the possible quality of 3d printed objects.

Re: Show HN: I built a synth for my daughter

#80

Post by woolion »

Were you aware of the Dato Duo (https://dato.mu/)? It's very cool for kids, except for the fairly steep price point.

The advantage is that it's limited, so it greatly reduces the wall of difficulty to manage to get some 'nice-sounding' music (mostly the restriction to the pentatonic scale). However, kids still manage to find the most horrible-sounding settings, and insist on keeping them as is...

Post reply on HN