Sure you know that Disco Stu from the simpsons has got all the moves, but what if you don’t and want to kick it like travolta? then there’s only one option: head up to MIT and check out their LED Disco Dance Floor. This thing is comprimised of 1,536 LEDs made by 20,000 hand soldered connections. that’s a lot of work. it can produce 4,096 colors, can be controlled through XMMS, handles 30fps, and the best part is that it’s 128 square feet. Yes. It’s a very impressive dance floor that has insane capability. there is a log kept which is very detailed and explains the process and how it became a technical nightmare. they made custom PCB controllers to use it and soldered day and night to complete it for a dance they were having. in the end it was pulled off and quite successfully. they also have an “epilogue” telling what changes they made after the dance to improve it. that’s MIT for ya.
thanks to everyone who sent this in.
Wow that is seriously cool. Could also be a good feature for a modern house. I particularly liked the red colour with the waves. Looks like alot of hard work though.
That’s the coolest floor I’ve ever seen.
Ever.
Way to go, MIT!
Wow. That is sooooo cool. AMAZING. If you don’t believe me, download the video.
PS: I almost got on this first!
We sell advanced and especial led dance floors, look your models here: http://hannoufmediagroup.com/portfolio-item/hmg-led-dance-floor-display/
Have you see this? Its a commercial version that Lightspace made ages ago:
http://www.pixelsumo.com/archives/2005/03/interactive_sur.php
All credit to the mit lot making their own though.
dude… thats it, i’m going to mit.
i at least would like to attend a party at mit
Bad ass, I like MIT’S better than than the commercial lightspace one. Awesome!!!
now all you eed is a large amount of people, and a copy of dance dance revolution!
And some UV LEDs and scorpions :-)
http://johnbokma.com/pet/scorpion/detection-using-uv-leds.html
A movie of a scorpion walking under black light is also available:
http://johnbokma.com/pet/scorpion/movie-torrents.html
#7 seems a little off topic, but anyway, I remember when Slashdot would steal it’s stories from Hackaday, now it’s the other way around. :( Old news…..what happened to Hack a Day?
Apparently they don’t teach dance at MIT.
Cool floor though.
Sweet, I’m gonna have to bust out the soldering iron and make one of these bad boys.
…and it’s dual purpose. Hang it on the wall and display announcements/messages/etc.
Or just leave it in place… Whatever…
Does anyone know of an english schematic and insctruction set for wiring up an array of RGB LEDs like this? There’s BlinkenLEDs for red LEDs, and it’s in german, but I haven’t been able to find anything in english.
Is there any sort of vga input controller (like use the vga out of a comptuer) that will control led’s? that would make thigns much easier…
Nice idea.
However, companies like Color Kinetics have been making LED lights like this for a few years now, and a few enterprising nightlife venues around me have taken to putting them behind translucent walls, which easily could be made into floors. Controllable via DMX as well.
I like the props they gave to the hitachi “let’s get perpendicular” flash cartoon in the FAQ page. Great project, it’d make for a really cool/challenging beer pong table.
Ledquestionguy (comment #13), you should check this out:
http://www.emanator.demon.co.uk/bigclive/rgb.htm
https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/bkpeters/www/LEDBed/index.html
Ive heard Avr do the best dancefloors around the globe and that they cant be beaten. check out the website http://www.abstractavr.com/avr/index.php
please comment
THe dancefloor looks great! I need a miniature dancefloor made for an animation shoot Im working on in the UK. Anyone know anyone capable?
MIT Disco LED Dance Floor – Hack a Day great article thank you.
From the moment you start dancing on a custom dance floor, you will notice the difference. As a dancer, you should not have to compromise or hold back to prevent injury. “Having an energy-generating dancefloor is a very exciting and interesting-idea”
I think the 30 fps is a little off. It only does 12-14 fps for full motion video. I’m sure some animation could be done at 30fps but addressing each led at 30fps is too much data for i2c to handle.