Modular Synth Now Includes a Hairy Animatronic Face!

If you’ve been following along with Sam Battle, more commonly known as “Look Mum No Computer,” you’re certainly familiar with the wacky modular synth sounds he makes with a variety of electronics. As he keeps working to perfect his bandmate, a modular synth named Kosmo, Battle realized that unlike most members of a normal band, Kosmo lacks a face. Or did at least, before he decided to construct one out of an array of cheap servos, ping pong balls, wood, metal, and a very strange “skin” material.

In a build process that will both delight and frustrate many engineers, Battle started this project without a set plan, and simply cut out chunks of scrap wood and metal to form a skull, attaching fake teeth, eyeballs made out of ping pong balls, and an eyebrow assembly that was “a bit rubbish” to begin with and appears to have changed in the final version. Once the internals were constructed, the face was covered with a furry material that was so thick that he actually had to trim it with hair clippers.

Electronics include a Teensy 3.2 board, selected for its generous number of PWM outputs, along with knobs to control the face directly, and patch cables to allow it to literally move with the music.

Check out the very entertaining build process in the first video below, and more shots of it in action in the second!