lantern is an interactive, audio-reactive home WS2812 LED installation. It consists of:
- a few stackable shelving units
- 336 WS2812 LEDs with some custom mounting/wiring hardware
- a Raspberry Pi 3
- a fadecandy
- custom server software, based on @scanlime's C++ libraries
- custom iOS client software
This repo holds the server and client software, both of which are very much Works In Progress. :) Current master branch has a known crash and a totally crap audio reactive effect.
The main things I wanted were:
- simple warm mood/back-lighting for the shelves
- more colorful lighting effects when desired
- audio-reactive installation/music visualizations for parties
- keep things modular and well-decoupled for reuse happiness, both physically and in software
- ???? the future is unknown -- other forms of interactivity?
- effects and mixer remote-controllable with realtime feedback from iOS devices
- low(-ish) cost
I also was on a self-imposed deadline to show off a prototype at a get-together in early February 2017. I was very pleased to make the deadline!
The server should build on OS X macOS and recent versions of
Raspbian, though there is a fair bit of set-up required there.
The iOS client is targeting iOS 10. There are separate readmes in
the client and server directories.
The server is written in C++ based on @scanlime's awesome fadecandy mixer/effect examples. The client is written in Swift 3. Client-server communication is over websockets, using websocketpp on the server and Starscream on the iOS client. For easy JSON serialization/deserialization, I'm using @nlohmann's C++ json library and Freddy.
I have dipped my toes into RxSwift on the client for a clean observer implemntation, but I am barely scratching its surface.
Also currently using HGCircularSlider.
I use Airplay in my apartment to stream audio to a couple of sets of speakers. Rather than trying to set up a mic for the Pi, I decided to try turning it into an Airplay server which could be targeted along with speakers. I have integrated shairplay into the server and it's working pretty well.
For analaysis of the audio stream I am using the wonderfully straightforward Gist.
The actual audio visualization is currently really boring so there's a lot of work to do there.
The shelves are Closet Maid brand from Home Depot. |
Messy! |
Lots of soldering! |
Slightly less messy. |
- recent persistence work on server is causing a crash
- settle on some audio reactive effects
- annotate effects that are audio-reactive; show this in client (eg, a speaker icon)
- redesign client interface (prettier; also UISplitView is too restrictive)
- expose some global settings (eg, Airplay buffer size)
- also client-side settings (server hostname at least)
- client should be able to request layout from server and render spatial controls based on that
- optimization of client/server synchronization
- .gitignore/repo cruft cleanup
- better documentation, both technically and of project
- turn client into more general-purpose LED installation controller/design tool?