Guy-Manuel (Gold) Daft Punk Helmet [completed]
Long before I knew about addressable RGB LEDs I wanted to make one of these helmets. Seemed like a lot of work then. Actually it seems like a lot of work now. I have some help so I can't screw it up too much. There are two being made, one needs to be ready for Halloween so you should see a lot of progress and hopefully a finished helmet. The helmet is 3D printed and the shield on the front is vacuum formed clear plastic that gets dyed for the tint effect. I have some pics and video on that I'll post when we get past the fun stuff.
There will be an MSGEQ7 7 band graphic EQ processing the audio connected to the Propeller which will run multiple LED routines.
Today I was trying to decide between low and high density LED strips. You can do more with the high density, but it will cost you twice the amount of power. I started testing using part of the helmet and some diffuser paper. These LED strips are 72 LEDs per meter and I think 4 LEDs in this little space is plenty.
The LEDs look much better in real life. Now that I'm sure 4 LEDs per compartment looks good, I can cut the strip and setup a mock helmet and start programming cool sequences. The MSGEQ7 won't be here until Monday of next week which gives plenty of time to knock that part out.
Comments
On my PWM tube turbines, I used big blue soda straws with a jumbo white LED in one end, shining down the length of the tube. On the unlit end, I used waxed paper, one tapered length plus a lightly-crumpled ball. Worked great.
We are starting out with Grafix Draft Film http://www.amazon.com/Grafix-Draft-Matte-2Side-18X24/dp/B013TDQRZG So far it looks great, easy to work with and cheap. There is probably some local variant at craft stores.
I wouldn't mind filling each compartment with a smoke dye colored resin. I'm trying to come up with a way to do that and keep it repairable, in case an LED dies or a wire breaks. I will have to go get some, I've never played with the stuff.
I was really happy once the LEDs were into place. I used JonnyMac's WS2812 demo code which can make just about anything look good, and it did!
I threw in a boot routine, and some mono VU meter action. There's a quick demo then some pics of building it. The diffuser material will be laser cut for the finished helmet.
I may need to lower the brightness for video, everything is washed out. Try to imagine the colors matching the non RGB version in the pic above for the shuffle mode.
Thanks!
It is self-building, here's what Nathan did over the weekend.
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/93gycakl6uhwhkl/AADW0EnYUFRsHWrqg1CSS5Sba?dl=0
Here is some helmet construction. "Welding" ABS plastic with Acetone. Zip-ties, acetone and epoxy are used to keep the helmet from falling apart. Friction welding ABS filament, epoxy and Bondo are used to fill in gaps, wet sanding is used to smooth everything out.
MSGEQ7... Really cool little chip. Here you can see the 7 bands it reads, and their response curve.
Here is how easy it is to use. The minimum timing delays are short, so you can read it very quickly and get excellent response times with an ordinary ADC. Here's some pseudo code...
Reset pin starts low, strobe starts high.
Toggle RESET pin (come back here after all 7 readings)
Pull STROBE low (come back here until 7 readings are done)
Poll ADC, store value in 7 variable array
Pull STROBE high
Blink LEDs with values
Some more on the electronics soon.
Not really, actually it became very confusing. I had some strange readings. Here are some notes-
1. I have no idea how the internet is hooking this up to an amplified PC output. It performs horribly unless the volume is around 1% to 2%. I guess it could be me, but I haven't seen any of the tutorials produce accurate output so I think it's them. EDIT: It is them, do not use a Y cable and connect to amplified output.
2. You don't need pauses and don't want pauses. If you add pauses, the decay time increases and so does the refresh rate of the LEDs. Another problem I had with some online tutorials is they're adding the full delay (or more) without taking into account how long the microcontroller takes to do things like toggle a pin or read an ADC.
Anyway here is the Propeller and MSGEQ7 connected to an MCP3002 ADC. This is a test mode that shows a solid bar when the frequency of the audio is around the target freq.
Sweet spectrum chip! Equalizer displays are fun. We built this Jeep at work, with a car stereo, bass cannon, and several hundred LEDs, including the EQ display up front. Jeeps have 7 slots in the grill, which worked out fine. I did most of the assembly and the EE's did the audio, so I can't say if they used a dedicated chip like yours, or in software. There are several micros inside.
Here is a basic demo of the analyzer mode. My job sucks today, and my brain is mush, hope the video makes sense, it ran kind of long. Anyway the LEDs are looking really cool!
Edit: My voice doesn't cover the entire audio spectrum, I was purposely breathing on the mic to make the effect more dramatic.
Ringer - OFF
Email - OFF
Doors and Windows - SECURED
Distractions - STOW
PSU - ON and SET
IDE - LOADED
Debris - CLEAR
Food - AVAILABLE
Blinky Blinky - ENABLE
I didn't have time to write them into my routines so I loaded the demo code and it looks really cool. 1080 on youtube does it some justice.
Visor tint using auto bulb spray. It came out better than the dye. The dye requires hot water and warps the plastic.
But TTYTT I didn't see "regular Youtube updates" bolded on your "emergency deadline checklist'. So keep crackin'!
1. Fly my super spy micro FPV wing
2. Build and connect the lower 5mm LED panels
3. Finish the code
4. MSGEQ7 on perfboard
5. Assemble connectors
6. Power supply
7. Battery
From left to right there’s the ADC, the Propeller (not hooked up in pic), the spectrum analyzer/mic preamp board, and the rotary encoder driver board(not hooked up).
After running demo code for weeks, it broke minutes before the Halloween party on Saturday. Forensics is investigating the issue. Preliminary reports indicate failure of all IO pins on the microcontroller, something I have never encountered (with such a simple circuit) before.
Thanks for following along! I think these helmets may popup again for next year's Halloween. I am no where close to finished using the MSGEQ7 to drive LEDs
The sequence in the beginning uses nothing but random number generation to make the patterns. Random numbers are almost as much fun as the MSGEQ7.
Don't turn up volume, there is no music.
PS - My apologies for embedding those giant dropbox images in this post. I tried to look at this post from my office PC and the page took a really long time to load!
Did you ever figure out what broke? Or fix the code that wasn't working?
It was repaired, and has been working since