V-Drum: An Augmented Reality Drum Kit

Abstract: Most modern drum kits are large in size and difficult to transport. Similarly, the cost of a fully stocked drum kit is far in excess of what an average enthusiast can afford. The maintenance of such equipment can be expensive and keeping the instruments properly tuned involves a considerable amount of time. All this can discourage many from seriously learning to play percussion instruments. Musicians draw inspiration from the world around them and in many cases are unable to construct a new piece due to the lack of readily available instruments. The V-Drum is a low-cost, portable drum kit whose implementation is based in Augmented Reality. With the V-Drum, any person with interest can learn to play percussion instruments and even construct music with the variety of virtual instruments at their disposal.

Keywords: Human Computer Interaction, Image Processing, Musical Instrument, Augmented Reality, Pattern Recognition, Computer Vision.