Objective - To create a portable digital piano that minimizes size, cost and weight by integrating with the user's existing laptop.
Background - The piano is a notoriously large and expensive instrument. Acoustic pianos are massive pieces of furniture that can take up entire rooms, and digital pianos, while much smaller, are still not portable to the same degree as something like a guitar. Smaller digital pianos have been developed, but can still be fairly cumbersome, often requiring independent power supply and sound output, which can be difficult to find on the go. Regardless of which model you choose, the cost is often substantial due to the many features that the keyboard will offer. This makes finding time to play the piano difficult for many busy individuals.
Methodology - In order to solve this, I propose creating a modular keyboard that integrates with the user's laptop. This would allow for cost and weight to be minimized, as many of the features could be provided by the computer, not the keyboard. The piano would only have two external connections, power supply and MIDI signal output, both of which can be provided by a single USB. This MIDI data can then be used either in proprietary software (a possible avenue for future growth not included in this plan) or the user's own digital audio workstation (DAW) in order to output or record sound from the laptop. The modular aspect would allow for users to purchase the size/range of keyboard that works for their needs, without necessitating the development of multiple sized products. These modules could be chained together in any order to produce a keyboard of adequate size while still requiring only a single external connection.
Expected Results - We expect that this product will be of decent playing quality, while remaining cheap and lightweight. This is expected to provide users with both a cost savings and increase in time to play their instrument, as they can do so on the go.
Costs - Current MIDI controllers that are a few octaves in size sell for approximately $75-100 at the cheapest, while being of fairly low quality. We hope that our one octave modules will sell for about $50 due to the cost savings incurred from the reduced number of onboard buttons and features.