Happy New Year! Today the display will be switched off and packed away for another year. I'm glad to report that I was finally able to get a sequence done and had the roof & DC Icicles flashing in time to music. There were a couple of sections of strip that failed but I ran out of time to get up and fix them. Here's a video of the display:
The Raspberry Pi B+ which controls the show worked flawlessly (once I get the configuration setup) meaning I didn't have to go out and switch on or off the display for most of the month. The single AC timer that turns on the AC lights & the power supplies for the roof & icicles comes on at 8pm and the Pi starts running its sequence at the same time automatically. Underneath the Pi is a network switch. The data comes out of the Pi and into the switch, and then across to the controller boards for the lights. I also had my laptop plugged in for an internet/network connection, so I could dial into the IP addresses of the Pi & controllers if I needed to tweak any settings.
So whilst the 2014 display was not as big as previous years or quite the scale of what I wanted to achieve this year, I'm still happy with the result as it was a big step forward and a HUGE learning curve achieved.
We took the kids out to see some other displays and Stacey saw some elements that she liked so I already have plans for 2015's display! Think pixels - lots of pixels :)
We took the kids out to see some other displays and Stacey saw some elements that she liked so I already have plans for 2015's display! Think pixels - lots of pixels :)