There’s an exciting development in that mysterious realm where art and science meet. A new device, called The Experience Helmet, has just been invented by Aiste Noreikaite. Participant-based musical exploration is nothing new; take the movement-sensing music maker in the NYC subway, for example. This, however, breaks new ground, in that it taps the unpredictable nature of the mind and its processes.
The surface of this helmet doesn’t look too far from a standard riding helmet, but its ability to produce unique sounds lies just below its familiar shell. EEG (electroencephalogram) sensing NeuroSky Headset technology determines the brain’s relative scale of alertness or tranquility. Based on this scale, which runs from 0 to 100 on both sides, the sound output will either be high or low pitched (depending on the level of tranquility) and consistent or staccato (depending on how alert the mind currently is). So in essence, the brain will be speaking to you through the instrument that is this helmet. Pretty amazing.
Early reports indicate that what emerges from the helmet is somewhat reminiscent of what you might hear from a Bjork or Meredith Monk track, which is to say that the music truly is unpredictable in its ambience or utter lack of consistency. But this makes sense due to the nature of the unconscious mind and how little we understand of it. Ultimately though, Aiste Noreikaite’s stated goal is to gear the helmet toward therapeutic uses. “I would like to help people with mental issues and see how this whole brainwave thing -the binaural beats – can make a person feel better,” she says According to her, one way to do this would be to create sound that would produce the much researched Alpha brain waves. But this may be an item for the 2.0 version. “I just wanted to make it as simple as possible. You don’t want to overload the music, if you do it loses its power.”
To learn more about this amazing device, be sure to check out the video below.
H/T: EDM Tunes