Instructions | KARAOKEBOT

1

Find Your Muse, Rip Its Face Off

Thrift stores are a great place to pick up weird, unloved toys on the cheap! The face for KARAOKEBOT came from a knock-off Thomas the Tank Engine toy.
2

Serve Your Will

Use an Arduino to listen for MIDI messages and a 9g servo motor to move the mouth as messages are received (source code for this is provided).
3

Lay Down A Track

Using your DAW of choice, lay down some instruments and use a speech synthesizer to create that uncannily human-like sound (FL Studio has a lot of great options built in).
4

Program Puppetry Patterns

Once you have your song laid out, it's time to program the mouth movements.
In FL Studio, set your Arduino as the default MIDI device, then create a new, empty "MIDI OUT" track.

Lay down "notes" in time with the song's vocals - NOTE ON messages will spin the servo out to open the mouth, and NOTE OFF messages will spin it back to a closed position.

(these steps should be fairly similar under an alternate DAW)
5

Body Building?

This step is optional.
I used a 3D-printer to make a custom body for my 'bot, but you could go any number of ways with this one.
6

HIT THE TOWN!!

It's finally time for your robot's big debut.
Is the world really ready for this...?

KARAOKEBOT