MaKey MaKey turns anything into a touchpad

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The very first Makey Makey prototype, breadboard and all

The second Makey Makey prototype in attractive PCB green

The Makey Makey board is connected to and powered by a computer via USB

A grad student made this working pressure sensitive switch by layering Play-Doh under a spring

Spelling out a word using alphabet soup and then touching the letters to create an email message or status update

An alligator clip connected to the Makey Makey board can be secured to anything that conducts even the tiniest amount of electricity

Examples of some of the items which can be used as touch interfaces using Makey Makey

The back of the third Makey Makey prototype, showing 12 more inputs and Arduino connections

A banana can be mapped to a computer keyboard key or mouse click using Makey Makey

Bananas being used as piano keys in a software learning suite

The front of the third Makey Makey prototype showing six inputs on the front of the board for attaching alligator clips, which are mapped to the arrow keys and space bar on a computer keyboard and the left button of a mouse

An 8 year-old user creates a knife-and-log interface for cutting virtual wood in an online game

Using other people as keys on a virtual synthesizer

Rendering of the front of the Makey Makey circuit board

The Makey Makey kit will consist of a main project board, clips and cables

Using pencil-drawn icons to control an online game of Pacman

The Makey Makey board clipped to Play-Doh, which act as game controllers

A game controller made from paper and Play-Doh

The Makey Makey kit will consist of a main project board, clips and cables

Article Summary

As I discovered when reviewing the Minty Geek Electronics Lab a while back, experimenting with circuit building can be a great deal of fun. There was one particular project in this kit that made use of the human body to complete a circuit, with a simple lie detector test being the end result. With their Makey Makey open source hardware project, Jay Silver and Eric Rosenbaum have taken such touch interaction to a much more entertaining and inventive degree. Everyday objects like bananas, coins, and even Play-Doh can be transformed into a computer keyboard key or mouse click to control onscreen gaming action, play software-based instruments or type out short messages.

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