[Voria Labs] has created a whole bunch of artworks referred to as Lumanoi Interactive Light Sculptures. A new video explains the hardware behind these beautiful glowing pieces, as well as the magic that makes their interactivity work.
The basic architecture of the Lumanoi pieces starts with a custom main control board, based around the ESP-32-S3-WROOM-2. It’s got two I2C buses onboard, as well as an extension port with some GPIO breakouts. The controller also has lots of protection features and can shut down the whole sculpture if needed. The main control board works in turn with a series of daisy-chained “cell” boards attached via a 20-pin ribbon cable. The cable carries 24-volt power, a bunch of grounds, and LED and UART data that can be passed from cell to cell. The cells are responsible for spitting out data to addressable LEDs that light the sculpture, and also have their own microcontrollers and photodiodes, allowing them to do all kinds of neat tricks.
As for interactivity, simple sensors provide ways for the viewer to interact with the glowing artwork. Ambient light sensors connected via I2C can pick up the brightness of the room as well as respond to passing shadows, while touch controls give a more direct interface to those interacting with the art.
[Voria Labs] has provided a great primer on building hardcore LED sculptures in a smart, robust manner. We love a good art piece here, from the mechanical to the purely illuminatory. Video after the break.
Just a video. Can’t find a link to any actual information.
How does the IR hand detection work?
What is the power control IC he mentions?
The article is generated, confusing, inaccurate and plainly worthless.
There are some details in the video, basically two light sensors per “cell” one with IR filter one without.
There aren’t much more details than that about the detection algorithm because “patent pending” bla bla… it´s closed source.
There´s quite a lot of electronics on each cell, and i´m sure there is way for optimization. Starting by the microcontroller that lives on each cell: ATMEGA1608 … yuk!
+ a 5V DC regulator PER BOARD … he did not disclose which one he uses
+ 8 HD108s LEDs per board
+ 4 IR LEDs
so basically the IR detection works like this: the IR LEDs of each cell emit light, it´s reflected back by the hand, and picked by the IR light sensor. The normal light sensor likely plays a role too.
It´s likely the whole color generation is done only by the ESP32 using FastLED lib
and all cells communicate with the main controller: serial in, serial out.
there is definitely a lot of room for optimization, but I keep that for myself. And the patent… I´m definitely curious about its application and content.