UPDATE :

Cut the wood and mounted kalimba to wood.

Bought knock off arduino uno which may or may not be enough to power this thing.

3d model

I modeled the plucker mechanism that needs to be 3d printed, i will be drilling some holes rather than printing with holes in the mesh because it may be easier but i dont know, i have to test this. 

My project is to make an automated instrument, the instrument I chose was a kalimba. 

Prototype plucker :

I am going to be using servos to play the instrument and have those controlled by the arduino. I am going to have a few songs built into the device and also have the ability for people to program their own songs.

The technical challenges are constructing the arms that allow the kalimba to be played.

The aesthetic challenges are hiding the electronic bits and making the linkages look pleasing. I may also add some lights that play along with the songs.

We have 4 weeks left as of this writing:

• Week one 
• Finish constructing box for servos and holder for kalimba 
• Week Two
• 3d print pluckers 
• Week three
• Code
• Week four
• Install lights and create user interface ( buttons )
• Finish odds and ends

http://www.makercase.com

Arduino-atrope

For this project I made an Arduino powered zoetrope with user controls so it can be interactive. This could be scaled up into an installation piece where they the audience can control the rate of the zoetrope and learn about how the eye works with persistence of vision and pseudo frame rate.

The model I made made use of a motor powering the zoetrope and a servo controlling a meter to how fast it was spinning.

Some issues I was having was not enough torque or to much friction on the rotating cylinder.

I did manage to film it before my batteries died and it stopped working.

This shows the animation:

This shows the over function of the arduino-atrope.