RE: Fireworks Simulation with Optical Fiber Cable (OFC) Day 4

colporteur — Tue, 24 Aug 2021 18:19:32 GMT

Great suggestion. Addressable LED's would save on GPIO's for sure.

The optic-fibre-cable strands are the off-the-shelf LED multiplier. Triggering the one RGB LED OFC produces light in 100 strands. Given time and resources there are lots of efficiencies that could be realized in such a project.

RE: Fireworks Simulation with Optical Fiber Cable (OFC) Day 4

robogary — Tue, 24 Aug 2021 15:41:46 GMT

A couple ideas I hope may be helpful........

1) You could consider using an I2C IO expander. https://www.sparkfun.com/products/13601 ,

https://www.adafruit.com/product/4132?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI9oSZqP3J8gIVIAaICR09OAZAEAQYAiABEgKIqPD_BwE

Ive never used one of these models, so dont have personal experience to share.

2) IO savings can be done using WS8212 LEDs ( NEOPIXELS for AdaFruit ) addressable LEDs. https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-neopixel-uberguide

My personal experience is Raspberry Pi cant handle NeoPixels very well unless dedicating your whole RPI to the task. Actually my last RPi project, I installed an Arduino Nano just to control a NeoPixel ring because the RPi IO was so distraught by the NeoPixels.

Arduinos work really well with addressable LEDs, you just need a separate 5V power supply when using more than a few.

The example code is already written, you just have to trim it up for your project.

Like you stated in your notes, you could even put in an Arduino per burst.

Arduino Nanos are really inexpensive (depending where you look), I often buy them by the half dozen or dozen.