but really, this is just feet only. for me the point is to have foot control as an element which frees up hands for other activity. like, imagine just out of frame i’m a virtuosic hihat player. play this video at the same time:
or try this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk-k3KzBZec
every bit of hardware i’ve made has been motivated by a musical goal or curiosity-- so while we are in the business of selling stuff, at $140 the walk is not going to make us wildly wealthy. we made this seemingly boring module in the interest of promoting explorative performance tactics in the modular environment.
a few foot switch interface modules already exist. our goals were to have something with negligible modular real-estate (4hp) while integrating several of the most-commonly-used functions of on-off foot switching: momentary gate per switch, toggles per switch, gate when both active (AND), gate for either active but not both (XOR).
this represents quite a few possibilities straight away-- stepping through sequences, gating a sound, etc. but these simple foot-actions can become much more interesting when linked to a scripting system like Teletype. a microcosm of musical variables can be working away, taking simple commands from your feet-- while your hands stay occupied with whatever suits you best: knobs, grids, hi-hats, saxophones, e-mail, tinder, whatever.
feet-plus-hands is obviously a common situation for guitarists or instrumentalists who use pedals effects. though often the stomp action is to toggle-on an effect or capture a loop.
midi foot controllers introduce great flexibility into a laptop setup. with something like max/pd/sc/etc the possibilities open up wide.
what have you are some inspiring examples of foot control?
