The modded musical Game Boys of Blip Festival

I’m at Blip Festival in New York this weekend checking out all the bleeps and bloops people are making. Blip Festival itself starts tonight, but last night NY Pulsewave had an open mic night and I decided to grab a few of the artists to photograph their instruments: mostly custom modified Game Boys. I’ve included a few highlights here, and the full set is on my Flickr.

Pictured above is Andrew Gould’s (AKA andaruGO) GBM1 Game Boy Classic. It’s a great example of the two most popular mods: He’s got a custom backlit screen that helps him see the music in the dark, and a wiring modification called Prosound which bypasses the standard headphone jack and wires directly into the device’s audio chip for better quality sound. He’s using the LSDJ cartridge, pretty much the standard for the Game Boy Classic performers. There’s also a custom blue screen protector he received as a gift from an internet friend.

Thomas Dyer and Jesse Henderson AKA Iniphiles – Prosound, LSDJ, backlit screen and a knob and switch to control the processor clock speed of the device.

Chris AKA cTrix – LSDJ, backlit screen, Prosound with RCA output so that the cable doesn't slip out during performances.

The back of cTrix's Game Boy and a closeup of the RCA jacks. Most Prosound mods add a 1/8th inch headphone jack to the bottom of the Game Boy.

Robert Joffred AKA Kill3r Whale – Clear case, LSDJ, backlit screen, Prosound. The back is a half of a grey Game Boy dyed green with RIT dye. He used to have two, but destroyed one when its backlight failed.

Sean Monistat AKA Let's Disinfect – Nintendo DS Lite running Korg DS 10 software.

Blip Festival Game Boys – Flickr