An effects unit, effects processor, or effects pedal is an electronic device that alters the sound of a musical instrument or other audio source through audio signal processing.
A gyroscope is a device used for measuring or maintaining orientation and angular velocity. It is a spinning wheel or disc in which the axis of rotation is free to assume any orientation by itself. When rotating, the orientation of this axis is unaffected by tilting or rotation of the mounting, according to the conservation of angular momentum.
An accelerometer is a device that measures the proper acceleration of an object. Proper acceleration is the acceleration of the object relative to an observer who is in free fall. Proper acceleration is different from coordinate acceleration, which is acceleration with respect to a given coordinate system, which may or may not be accelerating. For example, an accelerometer at rest on the surface of the Earth will measure an acceleration due to Earth's gravity straight upwards of about g ≈ 9.81 m/s2. By contrast, an accelerometer that is in free fall will measure zero acceleration.
A vibrating structure gyroscope (VSG), defined by the IEEE as a Coriolis vibratory gyroscope (CVG), is a gyroscope that uses a vibrating structure to determine the rate of rotation. A vibrating structure gyroscope functions much like the halteres of flies.
An attitude and heading reference system (AHRS) consists of sensors on three axes that provide attitude information for aircraft, including roll, pitch, and yaw. These are sometimes referred to as MARG sensors and consist of either solid-state or microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) gyroscopes, accelerometers and magnetometers. They are designed to replace traditional mechanical gyroscopic flight instruments.
Electro-Harmonix is a New York City-based company that makes electronic audio processors and sells rebranded vacuum tubes. The company was founded by Mike Matthews in 1968. It is best known for a series of guitar effects pedals introduced in the 1970s and 1990s. EHX also made a line of guitars in the 1970s.
Musitronics, often shortened to Mu-tron, was a manufacturer of electronic musical effects active in the 1970s. Founded by Mike Beigel and Aaron Newman, the company's products provided filtering and processing effects and were derived from synthesizer components. The company was known for producing high-quality products with many user-adjustable parameters, but high production costs and a failed product line, the Gizmotron, caused its downfall.
In computing, a motion controller is a type of input device that uses accelerometers, gyroscopes, cameras, or other sensors to track motion.
A PIGA is a type of accelerometer that can measure acceleration and simultaneously integrates this acceleration against time to produce a speed measure as well. The PIGA's main use is in Inertial Navigation Systems (INS) for guidance of aircraft and most particularly for ballistic missile guidance. It is valued for its extremely high sensitivity and accuracy in conjunction with operation over a wide acceleration range. The PIGA is still considered the premier instrument for strategic grade missile guidance, though systems based on MEMS technology are attractive for lower performance requirements.
Molecular electronic transducers (MET) are a class of inertial sensors (which include accelerometers, gyroscopes, tilt meters, seismometers, and related devices) based on an electrochemical mechanism. METs capture the physical and chemical phenomena that occur at the surface of electrodes in electrochemical cells as the result of hydrodynamic motion. They are a specialized kind of electrolytic cell designed so that motion of the MET, which causes movement (convection) in the liquid electrolyte, can be converted to an electronic signal proportional to acceleration or velocity. MET sensors have inherently low noise and high amplification of signal (on the order of 106).
In computing, an input device is a piece of equipment used to provide data and control signals to an information processing system, such as a computer or information appliance. Examples of input devices include keyboards, computer mice, scanners, cameras, joysticks, and microphones.
An inertial navigation system is a navigation device that uses motion sensors (accelerometers), rotation sensors (gyroscopes) and a computer to continuously calculate by dead reckoning the position, the orientation, and the velocity of a moving object without the need for external references. Often the inertial sensors are supplemented by a barometric altimeter and sometimes by magnetic sensors (magnetometers) and/or speed measuring devices. INSs are used on mobile robots and on vehicles such as ships, aircraft, submarines, guided missiles, and spacecraft. Older INS systems generally used an inertial platform as their mounting point to the vehicle and the terms are sometimes considered synonymous.
Kionix, Inc. is a manufacturer of MEMS inertial sensors. Headquartered in Ithaca, New York, United States, the company is a wholly owned subsidiary of ROHM Co., Ltd. of Japan. Kionix developed high-aspect-ratio silicon micromachining based on research originally conducted at Cornell University. The company offers inertial sensors, and development tools and application support to enable motion-based gaming; user-interface functionality in mobile handsets, personal navigation and TV remote controllers; and hard-disk-drive drop protection in mobile products. The company's MEMS products are also used in the automotive, industrial and health-care sectors. Kionix is ISO 9001:2008 and TS16949 registered.
Source Audio is a guitar effects pedal company based near Boston, Massachusetts. They produce modular effects pedals for electric guitar and bass, such as the Nemesis Delay, Ventris Dual Reverb, and Collider Delay+Reverb, as well as the C4 Synth, a modular rack synthesizer in pedal format, the Aftershock Bass Distortion, and the EQ2, a 10-band parametric equalizer with a plug-in style desktop interface. They are also the creators of the Hot Hand Wireless Effects Controller, a device worn around the finger that uses an accelerometer to send expression signal to an effect like an envelope filter. Source Audio mainly uses DSP to create their effects, and are known to program their own processor chips.
Spacecraft attitude control is the process of controlling the orientation of a spacecraft with respect to an inertial frame of reference or another entity such as the celestial sphere, certain fields, and nearby objects, etc.
An inertial measurement unit (IMU) is an electronic device that measures and reports a body's specific force, angular rate, and sometimes the orientation of the body, using a combination of accelerometers, gyroscopes, and sometimes magnetometers. When the magnetometer is included, IMUs are referred to as IMMUs.
Sensors able to detect three-dimensional motion have been commercially available for several decades and have been used in automobiles, aircraft and ships. However, initial size, power consumption and price had prevented their mass adoption in consumer electronics. While there are other kinds of motion detector technologies available commercially, there are four principle types of motion sensors which are important for motion processing in the consumer electronics market.
Pressure reference system (PRS) is an enhancement of the inertial reference system and attitude and heading reference system designed to provide position angles measurements which are stable in time and do not suffer from long term drift caused by the sensor imperfections. The measurement system uses behavior of the International Standard Atmosphere where atmospheric pressure descends with increasing altitude and two pairs of measurement units. Each pair measures pressure at two different positions that are mechanically connected with known distance between units, e.g. the units are mounted at the tips of the wing. In horizontal flight, there is no pressure difference measured by the measurement system which means the position angle is zero. In case the airplane banks (to turn), the tips of the wings mutually change their positions, one is going up and the second one is going down, and the pressure sensors in every unit measure different values which are translated into a position angle.
In virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR), a pose tracking system detects the precise pose of head-mounted displays, controllers, other objects or body parts within Euclidean space. Pose tracking is often referred to as 6DOF tracking, for the six degrees of freedom in which the pose is often tracked.
