Baby Tron Costume

Step 6 Programming

The programming of the El-Sequencer is actually very simple.  You can turn each of the ports on one at a time, but you should ensure that more than one doesn't run at the same time.  The code in the EL-Driver package will give you a head start.  There are routines that keep only one line on and plenty of examples of what you can do with the programming lines.  

For the purposes of this costume, I wanted to have two different modes.  One that I call flutter that makes the links strobe and another called twinkle that makes the lines blink sequentially. Both routines are actually very similar, the delay between powering the different lines is the only thing that really changes.

The more complicated step was to add the wireless control.  The El-sequencer has a built in port for plugging in a Nordic RD link.  I thought that adding a remote control would round out the effect.  First, you need to download the NRF24L01 library from the following Sparkfun tutorial.

http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/tutorial_info.php?tutorials_id=130

I would also look at the El-Sequencer code from the same page.  Keep in mind that the schematics have changes from 1.0 when that tutorial was built to 1.2 now.  The calls need to be modified to reflect the newer version of the El-Sequencer. 

On the other end of the wireless link, I used a Nordic Fob.  It gave me 5 buttons with different commands that would be sent over the wireless link.  Using the Nordic chips is actually pretty simple.  Once you get the timing right, one chips essentially sends a 3 element array over to the other device.  In this case, each of the five buttons sent a different value in the second slot of the array.  I built a loop that would read  the wireless register in a loop.  When it picked up a signal, it would fire off the routine that mapped to the button that was pressed.