There are many different ways to sync Christmas lights with music, but I can\'t find a modern tutorial on how to sync.
There is no need to do any programming at any time to have your lights match the music --
Have software to do all the complicated parts for you! !
Don\'t use low things
Use the network as Arduino and relay-
Control the connection controller with hundreds of lights refreshed at 20fps.
You can do that! !
This Instructure is an extensive overview of how to combine a Christmas light show with music.
It offers dozens of links to various power calculators, online stores, groups and forums on this topic. I don\'t go in-
But I give you the resources to find more for yourself.
After reading this, you should have a general idea of what it takes to make an awesome light show.
You might find a tutorial on how to use the Arduino controller and think \"Oh, it\'s easier than running a program with a computer or Raspberry Pi \"--
I\'m telling you here, no, it\'s much easier to do it the way outlined here.
Statement: This is an expensive hobby.
General rules-of-
The thumb is that once you increase the cost of pixels, controllers, enclosures, power supplies, random hardware, new tools, network power supplies, Ethernet cables, your show will cost $1/pixel, connect the wires, props, and everything else I forgot. Just FYI:)(
For anyone interested in this --
Stop them now, buy them a beer or 20 beers, which is cheaper than the hobby I guarantee.
Can also buy me beer)
I\'m far from the first person to collect resources about making a Christmas light show.
Here are some other resource links-
I owe them a lot of knowledge about wiki/Guide Forums
Several forums around holiday lighting are still using facebook groups --
Most groups are still very active and this is probably the best way to learn. Note -
There is a search feature where you can search in the Facebook group! ! USE IT! !
Don\'t join and post \"Hi, I\'m new here, what show do I need to do\" like the other hundred people before you\"
Search for something and you will find a post about it. Sequences -
Save yourself a lot of time and buy some sequences!
Power Calculator has a wide range of lights available for your light show
Software and controllers can support any electrical device if you set it up correctly.
One of the cool things about all these lights is that you can cut the straps or ropes to any length.
So, if you only need 30 LEDs, just cut the light bar at 30.
Normal lights you stick to the length you buy, so a string of 100 lights can only be a string of 100 lights.
The most common types of lights in these Christmas light shows are called smart pixels.
Each pixel is an addressable rgb
led light using the WS2811 protocol.
These lights can be controlled by Arduino or other micro-controllers, or in our case they can be controlled by Raspberry Pi, ESP8266, or a dedicated light controller like Falcon F16V3.
There are usually 4 \"-
6 \"wires between each pixel so you can push them anywhere you want without having to weld any wires. NOTE-
The terms of WS2811/WS2812/WS2812b can be used interchanged.
Technically, WS2811 is the LED driver IC, and WS2812 is the WS2811 placed in the 5050 LED package.
In most cases, their functionality is the same because it is the same protocol, especially the pixels.
You need to be careful when buying a band because some of the bands that use WS2811 (just the IC)
Only once per 3 LEDs can be addressed because it uses 3 Series lights to divide 12v into available 4 V.
Pixel connectorCross-
Compatibility note: As you can see in the last two images, pixels can come with various connectors.
Here\'s a list of some crossover
Compatibility between connectors.
In the future, I think everyone is moving in the direction of xConnect connector as the industry standard.
Two different connector types are recommended-
One for 5v and one for 12v
So you can\'t help but be careful to give 12v to a bunch of 5v lights and fry them.
Smart stripes these stripes also address each lamp using the WS2811 chip and protocol.
A lot of people don\'t like this stripe because they are prone to glitches and harder to fix than pixels.
If the pixels burn out, you can easily cut/Peel/weld/curl the connection, if the lights in the strip fail, then you need to weld on the small pad on the Strip.
This is possible and not impossible, but it is much more difficult than fixing pixels.
This is the cheapest rgb led light strip you can find.
The whole belt must be the same color and they use 4 wires (R,G,B, and +).
These lights require the controller to output a PWM signal on each channel of the bar.
You will want to stay away from these light shows if you use any controller.
Old standard AC light
Old Christmas string used by normal people.
They can be LED or incandescent lamps.
You can buy or make some controllers to control them, it can be one (relatively)
Cheap way to add more lights to your monitor.
The mobile head xLights software supports the control of professional DJ devices through DMX, such as moving head spotlights, lasers, fires and other things using the DMX protocol.
The projector/TVYou can use a projector with a light show to display an animation or video.
P10/P5 panels these are plastic panels with RGB LEDs set in the matrix.
Panels can be connected with daisy chains to make continuous panels of almost any size.
The front of the panel is weather-resistant, but the back needs protection. [
3D printing P5 bracket[
P10 stand for 3D printing]Note -
The number is the pixel spacing in millimeters, which is the distance between each pixel.
Therefore, the P10 panel has 10mm between each pixel, and the P5 has 5mm between each pixel.
You can also get many other resolutions like p2. 5 or P3.
But the most common is P5/P10.
Neon tube simulation is similar to standard tube lights in many stores, and a new product from Carey Lee looks like an old one using an addressable LED
Old neon lights.
Currently, this is the only store to sell it, but I expect it to become more popular in the coming years.
Facebook page: online store: to buy pixel/bar etc, there are several common software solutions that make music easy to play.
All of this uses a similar interface in which you can see the waveform of the song and drag the effect onto the \"props\" or props group.
So you can drag the spiral effect onto your Pixel candy stick in the quiet part, and then make all your lights pure green in the loud part, etc.
This is very similar to editing music or video and there is no programming at all. xLights -
Is the leading free software to control lights.
It has an active community of more than 5,000 users, and developers are constantly introducing new features and updates.
In January 2019, xLights was the first company to introduce full 3D modeling/viewing.
You can download it today and start playing this effect without any controller
Another free software.
It is very similar to xLights, but the user is slightly polished
Interface, many people found it easier to use at first.
There are already more than xLights. Light-O-Rama -
Is a paid program that also sells controllers that simply use their software.
This is easier to set up than posting in Facebook groups, more intuitive, and more direct support lines. It costs $50-
Depending on the level you choose, the price of the software is $190.
Song beat detection, bar detection, note length, etcxLights supports something called \"Queen Mary vamp,\" a plug-in that can perform some fancy mathematical analysis of your music, to find/estimate things about it and create
Its Download is on the xLights download page with the words \"QM Vamp plugin: installer for 64\"
Bit windows plug-in \". Install it.
Here is a tutorial on installing it.
Here are some explanations of time intervals.
It can make some timing intervals. There are many controllers that can be used to control the lights.
At first, the cost of the controller can be daunting, so I\'ll list them from the cheapest to the most expensive ESP8266 with the splitter --$4 -
Board breakout you can use the ESPixelStick software on the bare esp8266.
The data is output from gpo2.
You need to provide it 3.
3v and power the lights separately, but other than that, it should work if you are careful.
You need a usb ttl cable to flash the firmware (
Don\'t use the ESP8266 to plug directly into the one on the USB board, it has no way to put ESP in programming mode and won\'t use flashing software)
If you buy from China and may be the same product from the same factory, the price will be cheaper.
This can control up to 680 WS2811 led \'snodemcu breakout boards-$13 --
These boards use the NodeMCU version of esp8266.
This is a good change as the NodeMCU already has a voltage regulation and TTL converter to easily flash the firmware.
This can control up to 680 WS2811 LEDs \'sespixelstick-$20 --
The original ESP8266 interface for addressable lights.
For just $20, you can get the fuse output of up to 680 lamps and provide power control for 5v12V.
It connects to your network via WiFi.
They are \"out of stock\" most of the time on Amazon, but will resume inventory every other month or so. Falcon PiCap -$35 --
It is connected to the GPIO pin of the Raspberry Pi and can control the two strings of 800 pixels as well as the DMX output.
This is the 16-port RGB pixel controller xlights, which has a great page compared to many controllers, and I would suggest reading it before I trust me: you have read it, obviously, the Falcon F16v3 is the best controller.
Everyone I know is moving in this direction.
Or F48, that\'s the same thing, but it\'s easier to distribute at a long distance using Ethernet cables and differential receivers)F16v3 -$200 --
King of controllers.
It can control 16 strings of 1024 lights, and it can also provide output for Renard and DMX lights.
Two separate power supplies with different voltages can be used.
With internal temperature sensor, fan control, 5A fuse and indicator light, OLED display for IP address, and will support wifi and audio output soon. F48 -
$200 $ receiver--
The same statistics as F16v3, but it outputs data to 12 differential receivers in a compressed format.
The connector of the F48 is an Ethernet connector, but in a typical Ethernet protocol, the data is not sent technically (
With an IP address. .
Anyway, this board allows you to simply connect the Ethernet cable to the receiver and power the receiver using a separate power supply.
If your yard is large, it makes more sense to use the F48 so you don\'t have a big voltage drop of 5v or 12v and need more power injection.
To use it, you need to purchase the F48 and many receivers you plan to use (
$20 per unit)
Best control standard AC light
As we all know, the controller that can interface with the software and control the AC socket is LightORama.
I have not found controllers that are compatible with our software elsewhere.
Another option would be to make one yourself using Arduino/ESP8266 and relay modules, as I did here :-
If you use the DIY option, you will not be able to simply dim the lights using PWM.
You need a triac, like here: this tutorial is just an overview of how to make a modern light show with music, and I feel like adding a build guide at the end is too detailed compared to other guides.
I plan to make separate instructions on making different controllers soon.
In the meantime, here are some resources you can use to plan and build your first controller: to give a little overview, here are the controllers and the typical component controllers used in your \"master\" here are some other optional things to put in the box and you will find that you can use the lights with two voltages, 5 V or 12 V.
People swear with one light or another, but in reality each of them has their own ideal use cases and pros and cons.
First of all, you need to understand that there is a voltage drop on the copper line, and the voltage drop is in volts, not percentages.
So if you have a copper wire of 10 feet 22gw, the voltage drop (for example)
Opposite is 1 v.
So if there is 5v at one end of the cable, then there is 5v at the other end of the cable.
If there is 12 V on one end, 11 V on the other end.
This voltage drop difference is important because the 5v light stops working at around 3. 5V (a drop of 1. 5V)
The 12V light stops working around 8. 5V (a 3. 5V drop).
Therefore, you can run longer lights on 12v without the need for power injection.
If the concept is still blurry, just go to the pressure drop calculator for the 200 5v lamp and change them to 12 V and see the difference.
That is to say, the following are the basic differences and use cases between two5V light 12V light many people have found that the overall cost of 5v lights they use extra power to inject hardware and wires with 12V lights.
I personally used a mix of the two on my show and used different connectors for each connector, so I couldn\'t help but be careful to give a prop 12 v for 5 V.
Here is a useful calculator about power supply: If you would like to learn more about depth and product advice, this page is a very basic view of power supply
The voltage level is nothing to fear.
5v and 12v won\'t hurt you unless you try to get hurt.
However, you need to follow some basic rules in order not to hurt your device.
You don\'t need to run your show at 100% brightness.
This will use the most powerful force, but the color will be washedout (
More white than beautiful dark blue/red/purple)
And will overwhelm any other \"normal\" exchange Christmas lights you have.
I suggest running the lights at 50%
The brightness of 75%, if people are very close to your monitor, may even be reduced to 25% brightness.
Some people will also adjust the brightness according to the distance from the audience, so the lights on the House are brighter than the lights in the yard.
For the sake of safety, you should always try to standardize the power supply and cables to handle the maximum power consumption of the lamp at the highest power.
This helps protect everything in case you accidentally set the display to \"all pixels White 100%\" during the test \".
Power injection summary from the same power supply: If your light is powered by the same power supply as the one you use to inject, simply connect the wires and the ground, can move forward happily.
Since all of our power is DC, it\'s good that we can inject power anytime, anywhere.
You can inject energy into each lamp, just like putting all the lights on the 5v bus.
It should be noted that the power injection helps to inject the voltage on both sides of the injection-
So if you inject 5v at 75 of a string\'s lamp, it increases the voltage of the lamp 1-75 and 76-150.
Another convenient use for using the same power supply is to connect the power supply and grounding at both ends of the prop.
If the prop is the first item of the controller, then this is the same effect as injecting energy at the beginning and end of the prop.
Power injection summary from different power sources: data continues to exist, connect the ground together, and do not connect the two power supplies together.
Just to clarify: Do not connect 5 or 12 of the two independent power supplies together.
Do not connect two 12v power supplies 12v together.
Do not connect the two 5v power supplies together for 5 v.
Don\'t connect two power supplies in series to get twice the voltage.
They \"fight\" if they are completely out of sync, which can cause one or two power supplies to smoke. (Side note -
In fact, some server power supplies can be connected in parallel like this, and they more or less share the load.
I have never had the courage to do this myself, but theoretically based on your model it should be OK)
A picture above shows how to do this correctly in the middle of the string.
You can buy something you don\'t have.
Brand power on EBay is priced at $20, but it may be worth the extra $5 or $10 to buy a power supply for a brand you can trust.
Many people use the MeanWell power supply.
I personally used the wirewatts power supply without any problem.
Used hp/Dell server power supply is a popular choice for 12 V. They\'re $10-
12V 1200W $20 per unit (100A)power supplies.
Just look for \"HP server power\" on ebay and you will find a lot.
With these, you might want a breakout board like a breakout board for ParallelMiner.
The typical rule of thumb for general guide to distribution is \"for 5v pixels, power is injected every 50 lamps and 12V pixels per 100 lamps.
\"I found that this suggestion is accurate if you run the show at 80% speed --
The brightness of 100%, if you do not inject power by this amount, White will be painted red towards the end.
However as front mentioned of you don\'t should to 100%, even 75%, more than the power run you of show because color will be washed off.
You need to rate your wire to handle the electrical flow through the wire without heating. (Ad Hoc Working Group = instrument, by the way)
Use this calculator to calculate the meters required for current and wire length.
Generally speaking, the hobby of 20 AWG18 AWG16 AWG14 AWG10 AWGPower Distribution boar involves DIY of many props (
All steps)
, You can use a variety of hardware to make your life easier (
Or do something).
I have done things with my hands for 10 years and I have learned some new tools and materials in this hobby that I have never heard of before.
So this page is a handy list of hardware and maybe you haven\'t heard of it yet and you\'ll find it helpful for your build.
Pixel connector
The following pixel connector types work together as shown in the shardwarefm transmitter for each bullet point tool-
Many people ask, \"What is your favorite FM transmitter ? \"
Here are some recommended versions from China --
I will have you look up \"FM transmitters\" and find your own, a lot of people use them and have solid results.
Anything for $20.
The range of $50 and says there is a range of about 300ft (
Take about 30% of what they estimate as the scope of reality)
Sound card should work-
Improve the audio quality of Raspberry Pi using USB sound card in addition to straight lines, the easiest way to use pixels is to buy pre-
Cut the props and \"push\" the pixels \".
These props are generally corrugated plastic (aka \"Coro\")
It is made of polypropylene.
Props are very cheap compared to the cost of pixelsProp suppliers: However, you can also make it yourself!
I made a sock myself with a laser cutter and 1/4 plywood.
The result was great, but I wasn\'t as waterproof as I should have been before painting it and pushing it under the lights.
You can also buy your own corrugated plastic cut
Home Depot has some good size sheets with different thickness and I ordered the laser cut mine
Piemont plastic can be cut in size.
If you are planning to make any props other than items directly from Boscoyo/HolidayCoro, I strongly recommend you join the Facebook group \"Share your holiday accessories and props installation ideas\" for the features you want.
You can download some 3D print designs of the arch base, some tips on getting your giant tree to attach to concrete/dirt and attach things to the roof without drilling holes.
Mega TreesA \"mega tree\" is usually composed of bar lights connected in a cone.
From the \"traditional way\" to the store, there are many ways to build a giant tree
Purchase LED strings in pixels with pixel bars or pixel nodes (strings).
The Australian wiki has a good page.
Boscoyo sells \"toppers\", which is designed to connect to the wires, to help you connect the light bars evenly, and to have some kits to help you make a very tall tree.
Use this website to visualize your tree and first get a lot of statistics on it: people make 2 or 3 inch spacing based on the distance the tree is from the audience. Typically 0-15 feet do 1-inch, 15-50 feet do 2-
Inch, 50 feet plus 3-inch spacing.
ArchesArches is an easy way to take up space with minimal effort.
HolidayCoro sells some arches that you just need to provide the frame.
A lot of people use PEX pipes (1\" or 2\")
And put the LED strip inside to get a decent diffuse look.
The base is usually made of PVC or metal tubes with \"legs\" fixed on the ground on the sides, but I also see some made of 2x4 Wood.
You can thingiverse on the \"basis of Pex\", find a model people can 3D print to help you set up the common way of archesHouse OutlinesA, to make your home stand out is the overview window, corner and roof of the house with pixels.
Many people will custom drill holes on the aluminum channel to get a solid frame and they can quickly install some permanent accessories/hooks in the house.
If done right, the outline of the House will have a dramatic visual impact.
Some of the other ways to install to your home include that there is a good documentation for gears defp, so I will copy/paste from their description: Falcon player (FPP)
Is a lightweight, optimized, functional-
Rich sequence player designed to run at low levelcost SBC\'s (
Single Board Computer).
It was originally run on a $35 Raspberry Pi, so it is referred to as \"p\" for short \".
FPP is a software solution that you can download and install on hardware from many sources on the Internet.
The FPP is designed to be independent of the controller and it can talk to e1.
31, DMX, Pixelnet, and Renard to hardware from multiple hardware vendors, including controller hardware from Falcon Christmas provided through COOPs, or at the store in FalconChristmascom.
Basically you set up a Raspberry Pi running FPP that can control your light show according to the schedule so you don\'t have to have a PC running 24/7 to run the show.
It can not only run the sequence blindly as planned, but it can also do a lot of things, but that\'s the point of it.
Manual: Make sure to download the version of the hardware. \"FPP-v2. 5-BBB-
Btrfs, zip \"is for the BeagleBone board, not the Raspberry Pi. \"FPP-v2. 5-Pi.
Zip \"is a Raspberry pi.
It will run on all versions of the standard Pi (
Recommended 3B)
And Pi zero.
It can also run on the next thing platform detailed on wiki lebone, Pine64, ODROID, and wiki.
An alternative to using FPP is to use xSchedule with xLights installed.
I don\'t know what other sequencing software uses for this.
Other cool things you can do with fppnetwork. I\'m still trying to build a show network myself.
You can view the pictures on this step to help visualize a typical network of shows.
An important concept is to use a network switch for the Pi and controller so that the network switch routes the pixel controller traffic directly to the controller, not through the router.
Use Ethernet connections as much as possible to reduce latency and improve connection reliability.
Many people will make their own custom length Ethernet cables using jumpers and Ethernet kits.
Network resources if not obvious in the last few steps, xLights is the software I use in the show.
XLights is a very wide range of lighting display design and sorting software that is easy to use once you get used to the interface.
The knowledge about xLights is far more than what I can cover in this manual, so please watch some videos here for more information: Video tutorials if you just want a simple stepby-
Steps to start fiddling with the software you can follow this guide: xLights are split into completely separate interface tabs.
The 3D modeling software xlights is the first light sorting program with 3D functionality, which means that this is the first time many users have tried 3D modeling to make models of their house.
It\'s hard for many people to accept high
High quality videos they show, but can be fixed with the correct video settings.
You don\'t need a super expensive camera, you can do all of this with a mobile app.
The problem with setting up a video with a fully automatic camera is that the camera will do its best to get even/bright exposure of the object.
However, the lights will become brighter and brighter during the flight, and the lights themselves will not take up most of the pixels in the frame.
So the camera tries to make everything too bright (
Wash the color on the lampout white)
When you turn on less or more lights, it will make everything brighter or darker.
It also often tries to automatically
Focus all the time, it will \"focus search\" if no lights are on, which will cause everything to blur and lose focus until the lights turn back on and focus on them.
All of these problems can be solved by the following steps.
Manual exposure settings-
The following settings are just a general guideline-
Depending on your program, you may need to change some minor settings and don\'t let your lights reach 100% brightness.
Set them to around 40% brightness to get the best color in the video and videoperson.
Thank you for reading my guide and I know it\'s a bit wordy.
I hope you learn something from it, or it stirs up your curiosity about hobbies, and I know I just studied and sorted it out and learned a lot.
Please comment if you think I should report anything else!
If you know something about it, feel free to post everything you think I should post
I will be happy to copy/paste it into the guide and give you credit.
I am just a college student trying to help others learn and enjoy life.
If you like this tutorial and feel generous, buy me a cup of coffee or beer (
Or a bunch of pixels. . . )Venmo -
@ Jakabo27 or click Paypal Here-
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