Imogen Heap Takes to Kickstarter with Computer-Controlling Mi.Mu Glove

In 2012, Imogen Heap appeared on a Wired stage wearing what seemed to be magical gloves. Every time she moved, the music responded. One sweeping gesture would incite a dramatic crescendo; one wiggle of the index finger would provoke a shift from major to minor; one flick of the wrist would mute an entire string section. Liberated from laptops and mixing decks, Heap was transformed into a wizard/conductor/interpretive dancer who seemed to have every sound in the universe at her command.

She liked it so much that she wants to pass her superpowers onto the world. She and a team of tech-experts have been hard at work creating a set of electronic gloves that anyone can use. Having come up with a prototype, they’re now looking for Kickstarter support to raise the £200,000 necessary to facilitating a first production run.

The gloves, dubbed Mi.Mu, allow the user to interact with their computer through gestures. A series of sensors measure the hand’s position, direction and force of movement and this data is transported wirelessly, then transformed into musical elements.

Heap has been developing the technology for four years, initially motivated by a desire to inject more expression into her live performances. "In order to free myself up on the stage from my various bits of technology and to bridge the gap between what’s going on on stage and the audience, I wanted to create something where I could manipulate my computer on the move wirelessly so that music becomes more like a dance rather than a robotic act like pressing a button or moving a fader," she told Dezeen.

Early versions of the gloves were connected to a pack worn on the upper body and required elaborate set-up procedures. But the latest are much more accessible. The inclusion of an x-IMU board containing an accelerometer, gyroscope, magnetometer and wifi has rendered the pack unnecessary. "It's really simple," Heap explains. "It just sees this exoskeleton as a device and then it comes up on your computer as a wifi device and you're ready to go. It's super simple and it's great."

It’s expected that Mi.Mu’s uses will expand beyond music, to include design, sign language and, um, driving a vehicle. "I suppose as long as you can access your computer inside your car, there's no reason why you couldn't just sit in the back of your car and indicate right or left," Heap muses. "It's a remote control. It feels like an expressive musical instrument sometimes but it's essentially a remote control and anything that you could potentially do with your hands, you could do with your gloves."

With Heap at the wheel, that could be one interesting ride.

[via Dezeen]