First off, I would like to say thanks to Daniel, Mark,

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First off, I would like to say thanks to Daniel, Mark, and all the others who make up this great community.

I’ve learned a lot from the conversations here.

I’m working on a animated character that uses led segments for various expressions.

Some segments will change rapidly, while others remain static for long periods.

FastLED.show() updates all the segments each loop, even the static ones.

Is there a way to control which segments update, perhaps by selectively disabling controllers?

EDIT: Another thought, change the output pin somehow?

I’m thinking flicker issues might crop up, so an ounce of prevention as they say.

Also, since it has enough output pins for all the segments, I plan on using a Mega 2560 running multiple led arrays, one controller per segment.

Other than memory space, is there a limitation to the number of controllers on a Mega?

Thanks.

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I’d just leave it all one long chain. Map it all to segments in software. Don’t worry about flicker, in fact the faster you update it the smoother FastLED can dither at very low brightness levels.

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So far, on paper, it looks like a total of 588 (WS2812B) leds, with 18 segments.

This is my first project over 100 leds, so maybe I’m worrying too much.