Are any Mefites Madrix lighting software users (and or experts)?
May 21, 2013 11:48 AM Subscribe
We are building a mutant vehicle for burning man. It's a 20 foot diameter UFO that will be 10 feet off the ground. Does anyone have Madrix software experience with pixel mapping?
The "belly" of the UFO will be covered in 4000 WS2811 RGB LED pixels. I am using SanDevices e682 Controllers and Madrix to drive the effects.
So we are basically building a giant travelling party light that people can dance under.
I have the boards built, I have the 4000 lights wired in. What I need is some advice about the layout of the pixels in Madrix.
The pixels are 4 inches apart. I have 2 conceptual options for setting it up, layout in a grid of 4" squares, or use a radial pattern like the spokes of a bicycle wheel.
If I set up as a grid, it's going to get really complicated on the controller end, but the effects will play more like a giant TV screen... if I go radial it will still be cool and a lot easier to set up, but I'm having trouble wrapping my head around making a round thing in software that doesn't let me visualize it that way.
The software is mostly used by VJs and people who are in the Christmas Light subculture, I have posted in several forums without any luck. Hoping for a Metafilter miracle.
if you are curious, the build blog is here.
Thanks in advance!
The "belly" of the UFO will be covered in 4000 WS2811 RGB LED pixels. I am using SanDevices e682 Controllers and Madrix to drive the effects.
So we are basically building a giant travelling party light that people can dance under.
I have the boards built, I have the 4000 lights wired in. What I need is some advice about the layout of the pixels in Madrix.
The pixels are 4 inches apart. I have 2 conceptual options for setting it up, layout in a grid of 4" squares, or use a radial pattern like the spokes of a bicycle wheel.
If I set up as a grid, it's going to get really complicated on the controller end, but the effects will play more like a giant TV screen... if I go radial it will still be cool and a lot easier to set up, but I'm having trouble wrapping my head around making a round thing in software that doesn't let me visualize it that way.
The software is mostly used by VJs and people who are in the Christmas Light subculture, I have posted in several forums without any luck. Hoping for a Metafilter miracle.
if you are curious, the build blog is here.
Thanks in advance!
If you're going to be driving the effects by playing prerendered videos, you could maybe run all your video through a polar coordinates filter before putting them into the UFO? Or somewhere in the playback pipeline.
That's probably what this circular POV display is doing, for instance.
posted by egypturnash at 2:04 PM on May 21, 2013
That's probably what this circular POV display is doing, for instance.
posted by egypturnash at 2:04 PM on May 21, 2013
Response by poster: Thanks for the thoughts, my conceptual problem is going to be solved the old fashioned way, sheer force of will.
Like many things Burning Man related, this is a one of a kind thing that nobody has done with these specific tools, so I'm doing it and documenting as I go. I'll post on MeFi Projects when I'm finished.
posted by bobdow at 12:18 PM on June 20, 2013
Like many things Burning Man related, this is a one of a kind thing that nobody has done with these specific tools, so I'm doing it and documenting as I go. I'll post on MeFi Projects when I'm finished.
posted by bobdow at 12:18 PM on June 20, 2013
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