Disney Star Guitarist: Guitar Hero with a real guitar

It already exists - check out LittleBigStar - a free download is available and feature import of real tablature, audio files and multiplayer. http://LittleBigStar.net

LittleBigStar

- January 15, 2009 @ 12:01 am PST

The best part of this product is that regular guitars could be fitted with this 'intelligent' pickup. While Littlebigstar has the same intent, to teach music vs clicking buttons. The potential with this pickup goes beyond playing tabs. You could teach a budding guitarist to read sheet music, or practice techniques such as hammering, or string bending.

The second best part is that it's a common sense approach. If you're simply looking at the output of an analog pickup, an E on one string will likely look like an E on another string. A chord would appear as the sum of the individual vibrating strings. What if you wanted to teach all the different positions of one chord? You'd need to know what string and which fret is being played to give good feedback. I can't think of a simpler way than simply isolating the pickup for each string and looking at the signal before it combines with the other strings.

I can't imagine that Disney came up with the isolated pickup idea, but if they did, good job. A quick patent search came up empty....

TheDuke

- February 11, 2009 @ 08:02 pm PST

I am a guitarist, and I have what is called a MIDI guitar. This means it has a special pick-up which detects the pitch of each string separately. This then enables you to control any keyboard, so you can sound like piano, or a violin section. Pretty cool, huh? A company called Roland make and sell the pick-up as an add-on for any guitar. By the way, the easiest way to learn where to play a chord in different positions is to refer to a chord book. I have devised a simple method of learning chords, but I need to find a way of marketing it.

windykites1

- October 13, 2009 @ 06:10 am PDT