Task 1: Google DroneSinger:
First result: Victor Villegas Youtube channel with Drone Singer videos
- Had live music performances and music videos for various songs all related to aerial drones
- Youtube channel of 137 subscribers
Second result: Network world article “Meet the Tech Dude Who Doubles as the Weird Al of Drone Songs” by Bob Brown
- details Victor Villegas, with a focus on his “Drone Singer” presence.
- This article was published back in 2015.
Third result: Drone Singer Soundcloud profile.
- Contains a large amount of songs all about drones. I had to pay my respects and give him a follow.
The following search results are not directly related to Drone Singer.
As far as my thoughts on this go, I think the concept is a fairly unique one. I do not know of any other artists making drone education songs, nor did I identify any in the google search. I thought that the presence on google was impressive since the first three results were all about Drone Singer, despite its internet presence being relatively small. I feel like the content made by Drone Singer is underutilized because I know lots of young people are interested in drones, but the views that Drone Singer gets on Youtube and Soundcloud show that not enough people are seeing this content for how useful it could be.
Task 2: Google “Tello drones for education”
First result: DJI STEAM Education Products
- various programmable vehicles including the Tello drone all catered towards educating youth on technical aspects of these systems.
Second result: Tello EDU drone webpage
- drone product that allows for user-friendly drone programming
- looks to be designed to be able to work with various levels of comprehensive coding
Third result: Tello drone webpage
- very nearly the same product, but looks to be less technical for the consumer as it does not focus as strongly on the coding aspect to controlling a drone in its advertisement
Following search results are various retailers selling the drone and articles on the educational application of the Tello drone
I feel like this drone is a cool product and looks like a lot of people getting into drones for the first time could get a whole lot out of it. I bought a drone about a year ago, and I almost feel like I should have gotten a Tello drone because the coding aspect of them looks very intriguing to say the least.
Task 3: Google “Chet Udell”
First result: Chet Udell OSU contact info page
- Part of the college of ecological engineering
Second result: Chet Udell Linkedin profile
- used to work at University of Oregon. Good thing he switched to Oregon State.
- Went to college in Florida
Next few results are various profiles and research archives.
One result the stood out was “SpiderHarp”, which looks to be another experimental musical instrument that Udell collaborated with other professors and students to make a harp designed after spider webs.
The second search page starts showing Optron-related information. The most relevant website I found was:
- Myoptron.com: informational website on the instrument with primary resources such as blueprints and videos with Udell playing the instrument and explaining how it works.
I think that this instrument is very unique and if put in the right hands, so very interesting music could be made. I also thought that it is really cool how Chet Udell designed the instrument from the ground up with a majority of the parts being preexisting products, and making something entirely new with them. I am looking forward to trying out the optron myself.
Task 4: Download Max 8 software
The Max 8 software looks like a very technical synthesizer program that the optron runs off of. I currently do not know how to utilize it, but in time I will figure out different parts of it.
This concludes my first week of research.
