3 ms·

Is this actually buildable? I'd like to hear it on a real piano because (IMHO) the one in the videos sounds bad. I'd like to also hear how loud the mechanical

Is this actually buildable? I'd like to hear it on a real piano because (IMHO) the one in the videos sounds bad. I'd like to also hear how loud the mechanical noise of the machine playing the piano would be. Does the left hand work harder with the heavier keys? What would the hands be mounted to?

j_bum 2y ago
What do you mean “heavier keys”? Each key (on a good piano) is weighted to have the same force requirements to be played. Of course varying forces can be used to achieve different decibels, but the curve is the same across the piano.
- ano-ther 2y ago
  Probably this: > Every single key on a grand piano keyboard is weighted differently. This is because the strings for each note are slightly thinner and shorter in the treble register, becoming thicker and longer towards the bass register. As a result, there is greater resistance when playing low notes than when playing high notes. In other words, a heavier touch is required in the left hand and a lighter touch in the right hand. To emulate this in a digital piano, the keys are often individually weighted, with the lower keys heavier than the higher ones — something that’s called graded weighting. https://hub.yamaha.com/pianos/p-digital/a-quick-guide-to-weighted-keys/ https://hub.yamaha.com/pianos/p-digital/a-quick-guide-to-wei...
  - cbtones 2y ago
    It's not the strings though, the hammers are smaller as you go to the right in the higher register on the piano. The strings are slightly smaller in diameter, but remarkably shorter in length.
cloudbonsai 2y ago
> Is this actually buildable Yes. The robot used in this study is Dexterous Hand from Shadow Robot. It's a real product, and costs around $200-300k (for a single hand). Controlling a real robot using a RL policy (model) trained in a simulation environment is also doable. It's called "Sim2Real" and has been widely experimented in the last decade (with mixed success, though).
- criddell 2y ago
  Thanks for that information. There's a video that shows the hand moving and it doesn't look like it would be fast enough for anything but relatively slow songs: https://youtu.be/2ggpvigfEZE?t=55 https://youtu.be/2ggpvigfEZE?t=55
  - knowaveragejoe 2y ago
    This is more recent, and arguably going after something different(fingertip sensation), but I'm sure has overlap as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AofrJJaS8U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AofrJJaS8U
dheera 2y ago
> We use the Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) standard to represent a musical piece as a sequence of time-stamped messages corresponding to "note-on" or "note-off" events. A message carries additional pieces of information such as the pitch of a note and its velocity. I play the piano and I think MIDI does not have enough parameters to describe an acoustic piano. It's not just a single strike velocity that determines each sound. Where you play within the double escapement, how far down you hit the key, they all change the sound a bit. That said though there are better MIDI synthesizers, e.g. https://www.modartt.com/ https://www.modartt.com/ They still don't match an acoustic. I can tell the difference quite easily. I think a neural TTS retrained on piano data could do better.

j_bum 2y ago

What do you mean “heavier keys”? Each key (on a good piano) is weighted to have the same force requirements to be played. Of course varying forces can be used to achieve different decibels, but the curve is the same across the piano.

ano-ther 2y ago
Probably this: > Every single key on a grand piano keyboard is weighted differently. This is because the strings for each note are slightly thinner and shorter in the treble register, becoming thicker and longer towards the bass register. As a result, there is greater resistance when playing low notes than when playing high notes. In other words, a heavier touch is required in the left hand and a lighter touch in the right hand. To emulate this in a digital piano, the keys are often individually weighted, with the lower keys heavier than the higher ones — something that’s called graded weighting. https://hub.yamaha.com/pianos/p-digital/a-quick-guide-to-weighted-keys/ https://hub.yamaha.com/pianos/p-digital/a-quick-guide-to-wei...
- cbtones 2y ago
  It's not the strings though, the hammers are smaller as you go to the right in the higher register on the piano. The strings are slightly smaller in diameter, but remarkably shorter in length.

cloudbonsai 2y ago

> Is this actually buildable Yes. The robot used in this study is Dexterous Hand from Shadow Robot. It's a real product, and costs around $200-300k (for a single hand). Controlling a real robot using a RL policy (model) trained in a simulation environment is also doable. It's called "Sim2Real" and has been widely experimented in the last decade (with mixed success, though).

criddell 2y ago
Thanks for that information. There's a video that shows the hand moving and it doesn't look like it would be fast enough for anything but relatively slow songs: https://youtu.be/2ggpvigfEZE?t=55 https://youtu.be/2ggpvigfEZE?t=55
- knowaveragejoe 2y ago
  This is more recent, and arguably going after something different(fingertip sensation), but I'm sure has overlap as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AofrJJaS8U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AofrJJaS8U

dheera 2y ago

> We use the Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) standard to represent a musical piece as a sequence of time-stamped messages corresponding to "note-on" or "note-off" events. A message carries additional pieces of information such as the pitch of a note and its velocity. I play the piano and I think MIDI does not have enough parameters to describe an acoustic piano. It's not just a single strike velocity that determines each sound. Where you play within the double escapement, how far down you hit the key, they all change the sound a bit. That said though there are better MIDI synthesizers, e.g. https://www.modartt.com/ https://www.modartt.com/ They still don't match an acoustic. I can tell the difference quite easily. I think a neural TTS retrained on piano data could do better.