@Jason_Coon and I launched the open source SmartMatrix product on Kickstarter this past weekend that has over 32 patterns built in - most using FastLED!
Along with the Kickstarter, I wrote an Instructables tutorial that shows how I built the prototype, and how you can build your own using parts from Adafruit and others.
Even bigger thanks to Daniel and Mark for FastLED and keeping the FastLED community alive
We have an exclusive discount for FastLED community members if you want to back our Kickstarter. Please send a private message via G+ and I’ll respond with the details.
Im new to fastled and led strips but is there any reason this cannot lead to SmartCube eventually? I see a lot of Led cubes out there with soldering for each node, I was wondering if it can be done with Led strips… Apart from the transparency of the strips issue
I like the idea of a pattern-of-the-month contest! I’ll think about how to make this happen. @Stefan_Petrick I feel like with Noise Smearing in your toolbox you have an unfair advantage.
Hey, I opened up some of my toolboxes publicly and everybody is welcome to grab everything! But I’m also fine to stay outside competitions.
How to make a contest happen? First and most important we need a price - a bottle of good single malt, an Adafruit gift certificate or something similar. Probably also small but motivating things for the 2nd and the 3rd.
Next thing - rules how to find the winner: public voting vs. a one person judge dictatorial decision. Later maybe a theme of the month like “fire”, “groovy”, “psychedelic”, “never-seen-before”, …
I can also imagine categories like “sound-reactive”, “multi-layer”, “1k-code”, …
Oh, I just noticed, that you became the Kickstarter-Staff-Pick. Congratulations!
I was thinking an Adafruit gift certificate, or maybe Hackaday store, but the only LED stuff they have there is SmartMatrix. If top prize is a SmartMatrix Bundle + Teensy, the winner could take the choice of the bundle shipped from Hackaday, or equivalent credit at Adafruit.
What hardware should the contest be judged on? Not everyone has a SmartMatrix, or even the same WS28 or APA panels. I’d like to have the patterns be scalable so they could run on an 8x8 as well as a 16x32 or 32x32 matrix, but that’s hard to test for someone that only has only one size matrix.
It might be difficult to make this contest inclusive. I’ll think about it more, please let me know if you have any ideas.
Some spontaneous thoughts: It could be also an unspecific Amazon gift certificate which could be attractive for non US citzens. I thought about something small in the 30-50$ range - we want so see the contest happen regularly, right? Monthly a complete SM Bundle is a lot for just one pattern… And I wouldn’t expect high quality entries from the very beginning.
Hardware base? As it is basically all about promoting SmartMartix kits this is the only valid device of course!
So I see it all happen on a 32x32. Beside this strategic thinking 16x16 is a different league of possible complexity. 8x8, well, this could be recommended for rookie training before purchasing a SM.
“It might be difficult to make this contest inclusive.”
Yes, but no problem, because that’s exactly my idea - to create an elite club/scene/community of the SM owners, as stupid as it sounds. You want the people want to have one.
“unspecific Amazon gift certificate which could be attractive for non US citzens” - Good idea, I didn’t know there was such a thing.
“As it is basically all about promoting SmartMartix kits” - that’s certainly part of it and it’s the reason I would be able to provide prizes for a contest, but it’s not the only reason. I think the whole FastLED community would benefit from more people sharing patterns. If it’s not feasible to do a 32x32 pixel pattern on smaller hardware, then maybe there needs to be multiple categories.
I want to grow the SmartMatrix community, and I’m not sure thinking of it as exclusive is the best way to go about that.
I think it´s important to be very clear about the intention of an action first. What´s the specific goal beside having some fun?
Multiple categories are an option. This would include more people and bring up potentially more yet unseen animations. So maybe it´s not so important to have it available on all devices at once. When it looks cool it gets ported to SM anyway. From these point of view it could also be just one category: 2d animations. Probably a good starting point.
“I think the whole FastLED community would benefit from more people sharing patterns.”
I fully agree on that.
“I want to grow the SmartMatrix community, and I’m not sure thinking of it as exclusive is the best way to go about that.”
I see your point. What about a Matrix-community with SM being part of it?
I’m not sure which board you’re referring to with “version 3”. SmartMatrix SD Shield V3 will be at Adafruit this week, and has a microSD card and level shifting buffers on the board (some panels need 5V level data), but no coin cell holder. The “SmartMatrix” board included with the Kickstarter product has a microSD and coincell holder hidden under the board, but is only available as part of the full product.
If there’s interest I’ll consider selling just the board and panel as a set - the board is designed to work with one specific panel, not generic HUB75 panels.
Ah, lol, thats my interpretation of @Pixelmatix smartmatrix boards versioning. I saw a photo (on kickstarter I think) that showed the 1st iteration (as I interpreted it) on a breadboard, and the last image appeared to have a coin cell holder, I think it said May 2015, and that’s what I referred to as V3
My HUB75 panel works great, but my power pin out is different (no biggie) , I guess I was lucky it worked. I love the PCB footprint options for power BTW, that made it super easy for me to work around my boards connection.
I’m in the UK, so Adafruit is prohibitively expensive when I factor in shipping, plus import duty. The panel I have here was $29 delivered (direct from the Shenzen factory), closest thing to this here in UK is £49 before tax and delivery, and like you say, no guarantee it will work with smartmatrix.
I’d love to see a fully integrated board as an offering
I’ve ordered an infrared sensor, and I know I have some msgeq7 somewhere, so this has become the project that keeps on giving!! Everything else is on hold
@Stuart_Taylor That makes sense. The breadboard prototype would be V0 in that case, I agree.
I’m curious about the power pinout, can you send me a picture or (ideally) post to the new forum we just setup for SmartMatrix? All the panels I’ve seen have the same pinout.
We’re selling a SmartMatrix Bundle through Hackaday which has free shipping, but I imagine you’d still have to pay an import tax. Sourcing panels direct from China is risky, but much cheaper when it works.
