Outputting to LED screen

June 8, 2011 2:34 PM

how to output from a PC to a screen that is 24 pixels by 20 pixels?

I'm making some art! Using big panel of LED squares to make a wall of light. Each square (about three inches) acts like a pixel and can display one color at a time. Im having trouble outputting my 24x20 movies to this wall and having them show up correctly. Currently using this program called RasterMapper to map the pixels and a VersaDrive D2.5 from element labs to process the image. Long shot, but anyone know an easier way to output such a small video size? Thanks!

posted by AutoPilot83 to computers & internet (5 answers total)

This doesn't answer your question directly, but Monome-/Arduinome-like use OSC as a messaging protocol between device and computer, usually via USB or network. If you think of your 24x20 screen as similar to a large-scale Monome device, this might direct you to an answer.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 3:01 PM on June 8, 2011

That's the sort of thing I'd probably put together with an Arduino and a load of shift registers and darlington arrays. Mind you, for 24x20, presumably in full RGB, that's quite a lot of ICs. I'm sure there are simpler ways to do something like that with suitable driver ICs.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 3:20 PM on June 8, 2011

I'm a programmer, so this avenue isn't available to you, but I'd simply encode the movie as a series of stills (i.e. uncompressed video), then blt that onto the "screen".

So, long story short, I'd write code to do it. On an embedded machine, or using an FPGA, or with a full-out desktop, you should be able to get realtime video just fine.
posted by Netzapper at 3:22 PM on June 8, 2011

Hard to say exactly without knowing if it's a hardware or software problem -- how are the LEDs connected to the PC? Is some kind of microcontroller involved?

On the software end of things, though, this sounds like something Jitter is made to handle.
posted by speicus at 6:14 PM on June 8, 2011

Blazecock (!): Love the monome, but was looking for a software solution.

Le morte: I don't even know what those words mean, but I will in a week!

Netzapper: could never wrap my head around code.

Specius: MAX huh...
posted by AutoPilot83 at 6:33 PM on June 8, 2011