Quantitative imaging of the resonator shape in the bundengan musical instrument

The bundengan is an endangered musical instrument from Indonesia. To support its conservation, a non-contact method is needed to characterize the shape of its resonator. Here we report a low-cost and portable setup, which uses only one camera and one grid ruler, that allows for quantitative imaging of the resonator's shape directly in the remote rural areas where the musical instrument can be found. To perform the measurement, the bundengan needs to be positioned such that the camera can see the whole grid of its woven bamboo lattice. Two digital images are then taken from two different positions. Using a mathematical model of the setup, we determine the three-dimensional positions of all the points in the bamboo grid. These points are then used to estimate the resonator's shape. With this setup, we have been able to characterize the resonator's shape from one bundengan. © 2020 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.